Beirut, Lebanon:
Lebanon’s Hezbollah militant group released an audio recording Sunday of its slain leader Hassan Nasrallah, just over two weeks after an Israeli airstrike killed him in south Beirut.
“We are counting on you … to protect your people, your families, your nation, your values and your dignity, and to protect this holy and blessed land and this honorable people,” said Nasrallah, who was killed on September 27, in a recording said to have been made while he was addressing fighters of the Iran-backed group during a military maneuver.
Many other top commanders of the movement were also killed.
The Israeli military said about 115 shells fired by Hezbollah had passed into Israeli territory by Sunday afternoon.
A Hezbollah fighter was captured emerging from a tunnel in southern Lebanon on Sunday, the Israeli military said, the first such announcement since the ground offensive began.
“Shocking Violations”
United Nations peacekeepers accused Israeli troops on Sunday of breaching a gate and entering one of their positions in southern Lebanon.
It is the latest of several incidents reported by the UNIFIL mission since Thursday, in which five peacekeepers were previously injured.
“Around 4:30 a.m., while the peacekeepers were in shelters, two IDF (Israeli military) Merkava tanks destroyed the main gate of the position and forcibly entered the position” in the Ramiya area before leaving 45 minutes later, the peacekeepers said (UNIFIL).
On Saturday, a few kilometers (miles) to the northeast, Israeli “soldiers halted a critical UNIFIL logistical movement near Mais al-Jabal, denying it passage,” it added.
“We have demanded an explanation from the IDF for these shocking violations,” UNIFIL said.
The Israeli military later said the tank “backed several meters into a UNIFIL post” while it was “under fire” and trying to evacuate wounded soldiers.
Earlier on Sunday, Netanyahu called on the UN chief to remove peacekeepers in southern Lebanon from danger after the mission rejected demands for them to leave their positions.
He said the presence of peacekeepers had “the effect of providing Hezbollah terrorists with human shields”.
Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati condemned Netanyahu’s call, saying it “represents a new chapter in the enemy’s approach to non-compliance with international” norms.
UNIFIL, with about 9,500 troops, is in southern Lebanon under the long-standing UN Security Council Resolution 1701, which stipulates that only the Lebanese army and UN peacekeeping forces should be deployed in southern Lebanon.
French President Emmanuel Macron on Friday called it “absolutely unacceptable” that UN troops were “deliberately targeted by the Israeli armed forces”.
Lebanon calls for a ceasefire
Earlier on Sunday, Israeli warplanes also struck a 100-year-old mosque in the village of Kfar Tibnit near the border, NNA said.
“It was an important place because families used to gather in the square right next to it (the mosque) on special occasions,” Mayor Fouad Yassin told AFP.
Hamas ignited the ongoing war in Gaza with the deadliest attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, which left 1,206 people dead, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally with official Israeli figures.
The number includes hostages killed in captivity.
The health ministry in Hamas-ruled Gaza says 42,227 people, mostly civilians, have been killed since the start of Israel’s military campaign there. The UN recognizes these data as reliable.
In support of Hamas, Hezbollah began shelling northern Israel in October last year, prompting almost daily exchanges of fire until the war escalated in late September.
Netanyahu has vowed to fight Hezbollah until Israelis displaced by the violence return to their homes.
Since then, more than 1,200 people have been killed in Lebanon and a million others have been displaced, according to Lebanese officials.
Mikati said his government would ask the UN Security Council to issue a new resolution calling for a “complete and immediate ceasefire”.
On a visit to Baghdad ahead of Israel’s expected retaliation for Iran’s Oct. 1 missile attack on Israel, Iran’s top diplomat Abbas Araghchi on Sunday said Tehran was “fully prepared for a war situation.”
He added: “We don’t want war.”
The Pentagon later said it would deploy a high-altitude anti-missile system and US military personnel to Israel to help the ally defend against a potential Iranian attack.
In northern Gaza, Israeli forces have been essentially besieging Jabalia for days, with the UN’s Palestinian refugee agency UNRWA saying the fighting is causing more suffering to the hundreds of thousands of people trapped there.
“For more than a week there is no hope, no water and no means of living,” said local resident Muhammad Abu Halimah, 40.
(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is automatically generated by a syndicated channel.)
