Israel Matzav noted that there was an explosion in southern Lebanon and covered it from a Lebanese news source. (via memeorandum)
Ha’aretz reports that Israel is going to the UN.
Israel has demanded that the United Nations investigate the explosion at the Hezbollah official’s house, which it said proved munitions were being stockpiled in violation of a truce.
Hezbollah has denied that the explosion that rocked the south Lebanon house was serving as a munitions bunker, and immediately rejected media reports that a senior group official was killed in the blast.
An Israel Defense Forces source said the explosion indicated the Iranian-backed guerrilla group Israel fought in a month-long war in 2006 was keeping “banned ammunition” in southern Lebanon.
“The Israeli military has asked UNIFIL to open an investigation,” the source said, using the acronym for a United Nations peacekeeping force that has patrolled the troubled Israeli-Lebanese border area for more than three decades.
If this sounds familiar it should. There was an explosion in southern Lebanon three months ago. This was one of a series of incidents in southern Lebanon that led to a UN condemnation of Hezbollah. (via IPF)
For the first time ever, the United Nations on Thursday accused Hezbollah of violating the UN-brokered cease-fire that ended the 2006 Second Lebanon war, fought between Israel and the Shi’ite militant organization.
The UN’s Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations, Alain Le Roy, said Hezbollah had been operating a weapons depot in south Lebanon that was the site of an explosion last week.
He told member states there was solid evidence that the cache belonged to Hezbollah, but added that it was not known whether the weapons had been stockpiled there before or after Resolution 1701, which called for the cease-fire, was passed.
(This does not appear to be a formal condemnation, rather a criticism of Hezbollah.)
While the UN criticism of Hezbollah was welcome, it apparently hasn’t much deterred Hezbollah.
Mere Rhetoric expects that the next explosion in southern Lebanon may have a source south of the border.
Crossposted on Soccer Dad.
