After Hezbollah’s attack on an Israeli military base, which killed four soldiers on Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel would continue to strike Hezbollah “in all parts of Lebanon”.
In northern Lebanon, the death toll from the Israeli strike which hit the Aitou region, with a Christian majority, rose to 21 dead.
Despite Israel’s calls to move from border areas, UN peacekeepers will “keep all their positions” in Lebanon, announced their leader Jean-Pierre Lacroix.
We take stock of recent developments in the conflict.
Netanyahu vows to hit Hezbollah “mercilessly”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Monday that Israel would continue “to hit Hezbollah mercilessly” in Lebanon, the day after the deadliest attack by the pro-Iranian movement on Israeli soil in nearly a month of military escalation.
A drone attack carried out by the Lebanese Islamist movement on Sunday on a military base in Binyamina, in northern Israel, killed four soldiers and left more than 60 injured according to rescuers. “I want to be clear: we will continue to mercilessly strike Hezbollah in all parts of Lebanon, including Beirut,” said Benjamin Netanyahu during a visit to this base.
Death toll rises to 21 after Israeli strike in Aitou
The Israeli strike which hit the predominantly Christian region of Aitou, in northern Lebanon, left 21 dead, according to a new report from the Lebanese Red Cross.
A house that had been rented to displaced families was affected, Aitou Mayor Joseph Trad told Reuters. Eight people were also injured, according to the Lebanese Ministry of Health.
Until now, Israeli military operations in Lebanon had focused on the South, the Bekaa Valley and the surroundings of the Lebanese capital Beirut.
The Blue Helmets will keep “all their positions”
“It was decided that UNIFIL would retain all its positions despite calls by the Israeli army to vacate positions near the Blue Line” between Lebanon and Israel, declared the head of the UN peacekeepers Jean-Pierre Lacroix.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday again demanded that peacekeepers deployed in southern Lebanon withdraw from certain positions near the Israel-Lebanon border, saying he was completely « faux » that Israeli forces targeted UNIFIL, the UN force in Lebanon.
UNIFIL, which has more than 9,500 members, is deployed in southern Lebanon to provide a buffer with Israel. She denounced “shocking violations” of Israel against its positions, reporting in particular an entry « a force » Sunday of two Israeli tanks in one of them.
The UN Security Council was alarmed by the situation. “In the context of ongoing hostilities along the Blue Line, members of the Security Council have expressed serious concerns after several UNIFIL positions came under fire in recent days,” declared the rotating presidency of the Council, currently occupied by Switzerland, on Monday.
On Monday evening, the foreign ministers of France, Germany, Italy and the United Kingdom also condemned the « menaces » weighing on UNIFIL. “We, the Foreign Ministers of France, Germany, Italy and the United Kingdom, express our deep concern following the recent attacks on UNIFIL bases, which left several injured peacekeepers”, they write in a joint press release.
“We condemn all threats to the security of UNIFIL,” they continue, calling for that these “attacks stop immediately”.
Lebanon: Red Cross calls for protection of medical personnel
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) called on Monday for the protection of Lebanon’s health system after reports of Israeli strikes hitting medical personnel during fighting between Israel and Hezbollah. “I am making an urgent appeal for the protection of health workers, ambulances, hospitals and primary health centers,” said Nicolas von Arx, ICRC regional director for the Near and Middle East.
“We are extremely concerned about population displacement, the functioning of health systems and the continued suffering in Lebanon,” added Nicolas von Arx, then specifying that the ICRC was now encountering difficulties working in southern Lebanon. “It’s very difficult to access,” he said the same day an Israeli strike injured the driver of a humanitarian aid convoy in the east of the country, according to official media.
Funeral in Iraq of Iranian general killed by Israel with Nasrallah
A funeral procession took place Monday in the holy Shiite city of Karbala, in central Iraq, in tribute to General Abbas Nilforoushan, killed in Lebanon along with the leader of pro-Iranian Lebanese Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah, during an Israeli strike on Beirut at the end of September, noted an AFP photographer.
His body was flown Monday from Beirut to Baghdad International Airport, then by ambulance to Karbala. The funeral procession headed to the Housseiniya shrine, where a representative of Iraq’s highest Shiite cleric, Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, led prayers in the presence of a large crowd. Participants waved flags of Iran, Lebanese Hezbollah and the Iraqi armed faction Kataib Hezbollah, while chanting “death to Israel”.
The body will then be transported to the holy city of Mashhad, Iran, according to the Sepah news agency, affiliated with the Guardians. Another ceremony will take place on Tuesday in Tehran, before the funeral planned for Thursday in Isfahan, his hometown in central Iran, the agency said.
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