Comment on US urges Israel to stop shooting at UN peacekeepers in Lebanon

NOT_RICK@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

Just did some reading on the history of UNIFIL, here’s some highlights

In February 2021, Lebanese journalist and opponent of Hezbollah Lokman Slim was abducted and murdered by Hezbollah while in a UNIFIL-controlled area of Lebanon.

An official source within the Lebanese government informed Al Jazeera that, despite UNIFIL’s shortcomings, the force had been responsible for regularly hosting and mediating negotiations between Lebanese and Israeli forces, helping to defuse tensions.

On 6 April 1980, clashes between UNIFIL peacekeepers and the South Lebanon Army, an Israeli-backed Lebanese militia, began when the SLA attacked Irish troops based in At Tiri. The Irish soldiers held their ground and called in Dutch and Fijian peacekeepers as reinforcements. The battle ended on 12 April when the Dutch contingent employed TOW missiles against the SLA. During the battle, two UNIFIL peacekeepers were killed: Stephen Griffin, a 21-year-old Private from the 46th Irish Battalion, from Rahoon in County Galway, and Sevati Sovonaivalu of the Fijian Army. One SLA soldier, 19-year old Massoud Bazzi, was also killed.[239][240]

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