West Asia conflict LIVE: U.N. peacekeepers in Lebanon vow to stay on despite Israel’s attack on them

Indonesia confirmed two of its U.N. peacekeepers were injured in Israeli fire in Lebanon, and called the attack a violation of international law.

“In the attack on the tower in Nakura, two personnel were injured, and they were from Indonesia,” Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi said in a statement.

She added the two peacekeepers had sustained light injuries and are in hospital for further observation.

“Indonesia strongly condemns the attack,” she said. “Attacking U.N. personnel and property is a major violation of International Humanitarian Law.”

She called on all parties to ensure respect for U.N. territory at all times and under all circumstances.

– AFP

Turkey condemns Israel’s attacks targeting the U.N. peacekeepers in Lebanon (UNIFIL), its foreign ministry said, adding Ankara would continue supporting similar peacekeeping initiatives and structures.

Israeli attacks against UNIFIL in recent days, amid the war in Gaza and the cross-border clashes with Hezbollah militants in Lebanon, have wounded U.N. personnel and prompted international alarm.

– Reuters

As the war between Israel and Hezbollah intensifies, Lebanese civilians are increasingly paying the price – and this dangerous reality often becomes clear in the middle of the night: That’s when the Israeli military typically warns people to evacuate buildings or neighborhoods to avoid airstrikes.

Moein Shreif was recently awakened at 3 a.m. by a neighbor calling to alert him that Israel planned to strike a nearby building in his middle-class suburb south of Beirut where Hezbollah has a strong presence.

Shreif, his wife and their three children quickly fled their multi-story apartment building and drove away. Within minutes, explosions rang out, he said later that day upon returning to see the smoldering ruins of his building and the one next door.

– AP

Israel’s army said Friday it had killed Palestinian militant group Islamic Jihad’s top commander for the Nur Shams refugee camp in the occupied West Bank.

The military said Mohammad Abdullah was “eliminated” on Thursday after Israeli aircraft struck the camp in Tulkarem.

Strengthening Lebanon’s army will be crucial to implementing a key United Nations Security Council resolution that aims to keep peace on the country’s border with Israel, the United States and France said on Thursday.

Deputy U.S. Ambassador Robert Wood told a meeting of the 15-member Security Council that the international community must focus its efforts on strengthening Lebanese state institutions.

“The solution to this crisis is a not a weaker Lebanon. It’s a strong and truly sovereign Lebanon, protected by a legitimate security force, embodied in the Lebanese Armed Forces,” he said.

-Reuters

U.S. Vice President and Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris said on Thursday that de-escalation was needed in the Middle East. 

“We have got to reach a ceasefire,” Harris told reporters as she departed Las Vegas, while commenting on the situations in Gaza and Lebanon. “We’ve got to de-escalate.”

Washington’s occasional condemnation of Israel over the war’s civilian death toll has mostly been verbal with no substantive change in policy.

-Reuters

Israeli troops opened fire at three positions held by U.N. peacekeepers in southern Lebanon on Thursday (October 10, 2024), according to a U.N. source who was not immediately able to specify the type of fire. 

The source said one of the locations fired at was UNIFIL’s main base at Naqoura.

Israeli airstrikes on central Beirut Thursday (October 10, 2024) left two neighborhoods smoldering, killing 22 people and wounding dozens, Lebanon’s health ministry said, as well as further escalating Israel’s bloody conflict with Iran-backed Hezbollah militants in Lebanon. 

The air raid on central Beirut — the deadliest in over a year of war — apparently targeted two residential buildings in separate neighbourhoods simultaneously, according to an AP photographer at the scene. It brought down one eight-story building and wiped out the lower floors of the other.