United Nations peacekeepers in Lebanon have warned against a “catastrophic” regional conflict after Israeli forces expanded their aerial bombardment in the country.
Israel has faced a fierce diplomatic backlash over . A fifth peacekeeper was struck by gunfire late Friday, but it wasn’t clear if it came from Israel or Hezbollah.
Forty nations that contribute to UNIFIL, the UN peacekeeping force in Lebanon, said Saturday that they “strongly condemn recent attacks” on the peacekeepers.
“Such actions must stop immediately and should be adequately investigated,” said the joint statement, posted on X by the Polish UN mission and signed by nations including leading contributors Indonesia, Italy and India.
Other signatories include Ghana, Nepal, Malaysia, Spain, France and China — all countries that have contributed several hundred troops to the force.
The signatories “reaffirm our full support for UNIFIL’s mission and activities, whose principal aim is to bring stabilisation and lasting peace in south Lebanon as well as in the Middle East,” the statement read.
“We urge the parties of the conflict to respect UNIFIL’s presence, which entails the obligation to guarantee the safety and security of its personnel at all times,” it added.
What does UNIFIL do?
UNIFIL, which involves about 9,500 troops of some 50 nationalities, is tasked with monitoring a ceasefire that ended a 33-day war in 2006 between Israel and Hezbollah.
Its role was bolstered by UN Security Council Resolution 1701 of that year, which stipulated that only the Lebanese army and UN peacekeepers should be deployed in south Lebanon.
UNIFIL said that, in recent days, its forces have “repeatedly” come under fire in the Lebanese town of Naqura where it is headquartered, as well as in other positions.
At a summit on Friday, French, Italian and Spanish leaders said violated Resolution 1701 and must end.
UNIFIL spokesperson Andrea Tenenti told Agence France-Presse the peacekeeping mission’s work had become “very difficult because there is a lot of damage, even inside the bases”.
But he added: “There was a unanimous decision to stay because it’s important for the UN flag to still fly high in this region, and to be able to report to the Security Council.”
Tenenti said he feared an Israeli escalation against Hezbollah could soon spiral “into a regional conflict with catastrophic impact for everyone”.
There is “no military solution”, he said.
Israeli defence minister Yoav Gallant told his United States counterpart Lloyd Austin that troops would “continue to take measures to avoid harm to UNIFIL troops and peacekeeping positions”, his ministry said on Sunday.
Israeli forces ‘escalate’ attacks on southern Lebanon
Israeli warplanes hit a 100-year-old mosque in a village near the border on Sunday, Lebanon’s official National News Agency (NNA) said.
On Saturday a marketplace in the southern city of Nabatiyeh was targeted. There were also deadly strikes on a Shiite Muslim village in a mostly Christian mountain area and another in north Lebanon, the health ministry said.
The health ministry said strikes on three villages on Saturday killed 15 people.
The Lebanese Red Cross said paramedics were lightly injured and ambulances destroyed in Sirbin when a house was hit by a second air strike as they searched for casualties.
Israel has alleged that militants use civilian infrastructure in Lebanon and Gaza to conduct operations — a claim the groups have denied.
The Israeli military said its 36th division continued “targeted and limited operational activity” against Hezbollah.
Jets hit “Hezbollah launchers, anti-tank missile posts, weapons storage facilities and additional terror targets” and on the ground, soldiers “eliminated dozens of terrorists”, it said.
According to the NNA, Israeli forces have “escalated their attacks” on southern Lebanon, with “successive air strikes from midnight until morning” pounding several border villages.
Hezbollah said it clashed with Israeli troops who tried to “infiltrate” twice into a border village, sparking an hour-long battle.
It later said it shelled Israeli soldiers gathered in the village of Maroun al-Ras.
Hezbollah said that in Blida village, its forces engaged Israeli soldiers “with machine guns at point-blank range”. It also said a salvo of rockets was fired at a “base in southern Haifa”.
Israel said it intercepted five projectiles after Hezbollah launched around 320 projectiles into Israel over the weekend of Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar.
It also said roughly 280 “terror targets” were attacked in Lebanon and Gaza over the same period.
A Hezbollah fighter was captured emerging from a tunnel in south Lebanon on Sunday, Israel’s military said, the first such announcement since the start of the ground offensive.
On Saturday, Israel told residents of south Lebanon not to return home and issued new evacuation warnings for several villages.
‘Everyone is at risk of death’
In Gaza, Israeli forces have focused on an area around Jabalia in the north, causing more suffering for hundreds of thousands of people trapped there, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, said.
Israeli military spokesman Avichay Adraee posted an evacuation warning on X on Saturday for an area near Jabalia, saying it was “considered a dangerous combat zone”.
“There is no safe place, neither in the south nor in the north — everyone is at risk of death,” Gaza resident Sami Asliya, 27, told Agence France-Presse.
Israel has bombarded Gaza since Hamas’ October 7 attack in which more than 1,200 people, including an estimated 30 children, were killed and over 200 hostages taken, according to the Israeli government.
More than 42,000 people have been killed in Gaza since October 7, according to the health ministry in Gaza.
The October 7 attack was a significant escalation in the long-standing conflict between Israel and Hamas.
Hezbollah started firing into northern Israel in October last year in support of Hamas, triggering a near-daily exchange of fire that even before the current escalation had led to the displacement of tens of thousands of people.
Since Israel began a wave of airstrikes on targets around Lebanon in September and sent troops across the border, more than 1,200 people have been killed, according to the Lebanese health ministry, and a million others have been displaced.
