EU members of UNIFIL call for revised rules of engagement in Lebanon
Sixteen EU nations that contribute soldiers to the UN’s peacekeeping mission – such as Italy, Spain and France – have made the call without offering details.
A letter signed by the countries said the mission’s rules of engagement need to be more effective after a series of widely condemned Israeli attacks on UNIFIL positions.
“The message we want to send to Israel is that if you stop your army, the UN can also change its approach in that part of Lebanon, so that we can peacefully achieve what you’re now trying to do by attacking Hezbollah’s bases militarily,” Italian Defence Minister Guido Crosetto told RAI television.
UNIFIL says Israeli tank deliberately targeted position
The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) has issued a statement saying that an Israeli tank targeted yet another UN position in southern Lebanon earlier today.
The peacekeeping mission said that one of its watchtowers in the Lebanese village of Kfar Kila was struck by an Israeli Merkava tank, destroying two cameras and damaging the tower.
“Yet again we see direct and apparently deliberate fire at a UNIFIL position,” the statement says.
Israel has targeted UNIFIL positions several times in the last week, in an apparent attempt to get the agency to heed its public calls for it to withdraw peacekeeping forces.
‘Fierce battle’ taking place between Israel and Hezbollah on border
Reports are emerging of fierce fighting between Israeli forces and Hezbollah in the central section of the Israel-Lebanon border, Al Jazeera’s Ali Hashem reports.
Speaking from Beirut, he said fighting was taking place around several towns. “We’ve seen these pictures of helicopters, and it seems this battle is taking a very serious direction with reports of several helicopters taking casualties towards Israel,” he said.
“Israel has been trying to advance on several other [fronts], mainly on the eastern sector. We see pictures of Israeli soldiers in Lebanese towns, but still, we understand, at least from the Hezbollah statements, that Hezbollah is trying to push them back.”
He said large numbers of people were struggling to survive day to day, even as they worried about how long the fighting would go on. “It’s clear whatever is happening around us that this is a very long journey,” he said.
Lebanon says 27 people killed in Israeli strikes in 24 hours
The Lebanese health ministry has said that Israeli strikes across the country have killed 27 people and injured 185 over the last 24 hours, as Israel presses forward with a heavy and indiscriminate bombing campaign.
The ministry says 2,377 people have been killed and 11,109 wounded since the current round of fighting between Hezbollah and Israel began last year, with the vast majority of those deaths taking place in the last few weeks as Israel expands its attacks into densely packed areas.
Rescue workers carry remains of people at at site that was hit by Israeli airstrikes in Qana village, south Lebanon, Wednesday
Hezbollah says it attacked Israeli soldiers in Khallet Warde
Hezbollah has said it has attacked a group of Israeli troops in the area of Khallet Warde, opposite the Lebanese village of Aita al-Shaab, which has been bombed repeatedly by the Israeli army.
Writing on its Telegram channel, Hezbollah said it targeted “a gathering of Israeli enemy soldiers” with a rocket.
