Mona Khalil watches small sea turtles crawling on the sandy beach of al-Mansouri, south of Beirut, in 2003. Khalil, a protector of sea turtle hatching sites, died Saturday after sustaining injuries in an Israeli attack on Lebanon on June 5. File Photo by Nabil Mounzer/EPA
June 20 (UPI) -- A Lebanese conservationist and protector of sea turtles died from injuries she suffered when her home was hit by an Israeli strike.
Mona Khalil, 76, died after suffering injuries from an Israeli attack on her home at al-Mounsouri Beach on Lebanon's southern coast on June 5. Her assistant was also injured in the attack, according to Green Southerners, a local nonprofit.
The Israeli military told CNN that Khalil "was not a target" of the Israel Defense Forces. "There is no known IDF strike in which she was injured," the military said in a statement Saturday. "However, strikes were conducted in the area after the IDF issued evacuation warnings."
Khalil was born in Lagos, Nigeria, and moved to her parents' homeland Lebanon at age 7. In her 20s, she fled to the Netherlands to escape the Lebanese civil war and became a porcelain restorer. She attained British citizenship because she was born in a British colony.
