UN says Israeli tanks burst into peacekeeper base, Israel gives different account
Israel’s Netanyahu tells UN to withdraw peacekeepers from Hezbollah strongholds and combat zones
The United Nations said on Sunday Israeli tanks had burst through the gates of a base of its peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon, the latest accusation of Israeli violations and attacks denounced by its own allies.
The UNIFIL peacekeeping force said two Israeli Merkava tanks destroyed the main gate of a base and forcibly entered before dawn on Sunday morning. After the tanks left, shells exploded 100 metres away, releasing smoke which blew across the base and sickened UN personnel, it said in a statement.
In its version of events, the Israeli military said militants of the Iran-backed group Hezbollah had fired anti-tank missiles at Israeli troops, wounding 25 of them. The attack was very close to a UNIFIL post and a tank helping evacuate the casualties under fire then backed into the UNIFIL post, it said.
“It is not storming a base. It is not trying to enter a base. It was a tank under heavy fire, mass casualty event, backing up to get out of harm’s way,” the military’s international spokesperson Nadav Shoshani told reporters.
In a statement, the military said it used a smoke screen to provide cover for the evacuation of the wounded soldiers but its actions posed no danger to the UN peacekeeping force.
