Israel fired at three Unifil positions in southern Lebanon, UN says

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The UN peacekeeping mission in Lebanon, Unifil, confirmed on Thursday that two of its members were wounded after they came under fire in southern Lebanon, where Israeli forces and Hezbollah are engaged in continuing battles.
UN spokesman Farhan Haq told The National the injured peacekeepers were Indonesian. Irish and Italian Blue Helmets have also used the base that was targeted.
“This morning, two peacekeepers were injured after an IDF Merkava tank fired its weapon towards an observation tower at Unifil’s headquarters in Naqoura, directly hitting it and causing them to fall,” a Unifil representative said.
Unifil said the injuries were not serious but the troops remain in hospital, adding that the mission’s Naqoura headquarters and nearby positions had been repeatedly hit.
An Israeli military drone “was observed flying inside the UN position up to the bunker entrance”, Unifil reported. Israeli soldiers deliberately fired at and disabled perimeter-monitoring cameras, it said.
On Wednesday, Israeli soldiers “deliberately fired at and disabled the position’s perimeter-monitoring cameras”, it added.
“They also deliberately fired on [a site] where regular tripartite meetings were held before the conflict began, damaging lighting and a relay station.”
Unifil said it has repeatedly reminded both parties to avoid actions that endanger its 10,000 peacekeepers amid the escalating conflict and warned that any deliberate attack on peacekeepers is a grave violation of international humanitarian law and of Security Council resolution 1701.
Italy’s Defence Minister Guido Crosetto condemned the shooting at the UN peacekeeping force.
“The shooting at the Unifil headquarters” and other incidents involving “small arms fire” are “intolerable, they must be carefully and decisively avoided,” Mr Crosetto said in a statement. “For these reasons, I protested to my Israeli counterpart and the Israeli ambassador to Italy.”
Last week, Unifil reported that the Israeli military requested its peacekeepers to “relocate” from certain positions ahead of Israel’s ground operations in Lebanon. The peacekeeping mission rejected the request.
Unifil was set up in 1978 to monitor the withdrawal of Israeli forces after they invaded Lebanon in reprisal for a Palestinian attack.
It was bolstered in Security Council Resolution 1701 after Hezbollah and Israel fought a war in 2006, and its peacekeepers are now responsible for monitoring the ceasefire between the two sides.