Report: Lebanese forces near Israeli border on alert
Tensions along northern border heightened following series of incidents, including fire at Hezbollah arms cache, infiltration of unarmed civilians into Israel; LBC television network reports Lebanese army to raise alert level
Lebanese army forces deployed near the border with Israel are on alert, the LBC television network reported Monday.
According to the Lebanese TV station, the forces' alert level was raised in response to Israeli violations of UN Resolution 1701, which ended Israel's war with Hizbullah in the summer of 2006. The report mentioned the erection of a military outpost near Kafr Shuba, a village just outside the divided border village of Ghajar, as an example of one of these "violations."
A series of incidents have resulted in heightened tensions along the Lebanon-Israel border. Over the weekend a group of fifteen Lebanese citizens, including several children, crossed the border from Lebanon into Israel. The people were carrying Hezbollah and Lebanese flags.
The group crossed the border at a spot where no fence exists, and walked to the Israeli side. IDF soldiers spotted them, but seeing they were unarmed, and had children with them, decided not to respond.
Several minutes after crossing the border, the group turned back and returned to Lebanese territory.
Ten days prior to that incident Israel security forces apprehended a 30-year-old Lebanese citizen who crossed the border into Israel. The man, who was unarmed, was taken in for questioning. On July 11 Lebanese security forces located two Katyusha rockets in the southern district of Nabatiye. The rockets were not ready to launch.
About a week ago an apparent fire at a Hezbollah weapons cache located some nine miles from the border caused a series of explosions in an abandoned building near the border with Israel. A few days later dozens of villagers in Bir el-Salasel prevented United Nations peacekeepers from searching the building. The villagers demanded that the peacekeepers to leave and threw stones at their vehicles. Fourteen UNIFIL observers sustained mild injuries.
UNIFIL called the Hezbollah weapons cache was a "serious violation" of the UN-brokered ceasefire that ended the Second Lebanon War.
The blasts caused no casualties but highlighted the long-held suspicion that the Shiite militant group has maintained a military presence in the region near Israel's border despite the deployment of Lebanese troops and UN peacekeepers there under a resolution that bans such unauthorized activity.
