The first UN aid convoy headed for the Lebanese south 14 days after the start of the Israeli offensive. (Reuters)

CAIRO — A proposal championed by IslamOnline.net for a galaxy of 250 world dignitaries to lead convoys of urgently-needed relief aid to the war-ravaged Lebanese people is gaining increasing support.

The International Conference on Lebanon and Palestine Relief, to be held in Cairo on July 31 with the participation of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), the Arab League and the World Health Organization (WHO), has decided to endorse the initiative.

"We are sponsoring the idea and have added it is one of the conference's five goals," Ahmed Matar, a member of the organizing committee, told IOL.

The conference will bring together representatives of several international bodies and civil society organizations to discuss aiding the Lebanese people.

The IOL initiative is based on securing the approval of 250 world figures, including politicians, scholars, artists and sport stars, to personally lead aid convoys to Lebanon.

Routes taken by the relief convoys will be made public to the international community in advance and the trucks would be clearly marked to avoid being targeted.

Unrelenting and shambolic Israeli strikes have so far killed more than 410 Lebanese, mostly children and civilians, and targeted several aid trucks since July 12.

Some 800,000 Lebanese have been forced to flee their homes in the south and many more remain trapped in villages and under the rubble of their homes.

Lebanon's hard-won infrastructure has also been left in ruins, with Israel knocking out Beirut international airport, bombing ports, destroying bridges and setting power stations ablaze.

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Matar said the conference will probe coordination among international parties to create safe aid corridors.

Provision of the necessary humanitarian aid and launching fund-raising campaigns will also top the agenda, he added.

The conference will also organized a charity dinner to raise LE5 million ($850,000) for the affected people.

"We are seeking to benefit from this international gathering to launch and develop relief campaigns for the Palestinian and Lebanese people," said Dalia Yusuf, Managing Editor, of IOL's European Muslims section.

She added that the initiative has already started drawing support from some Egyptian figures.

Abul-Ela Madi and Essam Sultan, co-founders of the under construction al-Wasat party, and Manar al-Shurbagi, a professor of political science at the American University in Cairo (AUC), were among the first to sign up.

"They are already contacting other world figures known for their staunch support for humanitarian cases as well as international relief organizations," added Yusuf.

UN relief coordinator Jan Egeland has said that Lebanon was suffering a "major" humanitarian crisis.

He has also decried the Israeli blockade on Lebanon which has blocked the delivery of humanitarian aid.

On Wednesday, a UN convoy of 10 trucks carrying urgently needed aid was heading for south Lebanon, the first such assistance to a region cut off from the outside world by Israel's military offensive.

The convoy was carrying food and medicines and hygiene supplies including 90 tons of wheat flour as well as emergency medical kits.