JERUSALEM: The United Nations and France on Monday condemned Israeli fire near UN peacekeeping troops in southern Lebanon, after an incident during which peacekeepers neutralized an Israeli reconnaissance drone.
“We are very concerned about the incident that occurred on Sunday in which an Israeli drone dropped a grenade in the vicinity of a UNIFIL patrol, and subsequently an Israeli tank fired a shot at the peacekeepers in Kfar Kila in the UNIFIL area of operations,” said UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric, referring to the incident in southern Lebanon.
“Our colleagues at UNIFIL are in touch with the IDF to protest vehemently what has happened. It’s not the first time that we feel we’ve been targeted in different ways by the IDF (including) pointing lasers or warning shots. It’s very, very dangerous,” he said.
The UN peacekeeping force known as UNIFIL works with the Lebanese army to enforce the ceasefire agreement that ended more than a year of conflict between Iran-backed Lebanese group Hezbollah and Israel.
According to a French diplomatic source, the UNIFIL troops involved in Sunday’s incident were French.
