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Israel files grievance against Hezbollah as UNSC retools UNIFIL

Israel and the United States are campaigning for the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon's mandate to be revised, empowering the force to eject Hezbollah from south Lebanon.
A United Nations Interim Forces in Lebanon (UNIFIL) armoured vehicle is parked under a portrait of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah on a side road in the southern Lebanese town of Kfar Kila near the border with Israel on January 3, 2020. - Following this morning's killing of Iranian commander, Major General Qasem Soleimani, Lebanon's Iran-backed Hezbollah movement called for the missile strike by Israel's closest ally, to be avenged. "Meting out the appropriate punishment to these criminal assassins... wil

Gilad Erdan, Israel’s new ambassador to the United Nations, filed a formal complaint Aug. 17 with the United Nations Security Council over a July 27 incident along the Lebanese border, in which IDF soldiers foiled an attack by Hezbollah.

Tensions on the Israel-Lebanon-Syria borders have been high since July 22, when Hezbollah operative Ali Kamel Mohsen Jawad was killed in an airstrike near the Damascus International Airport. Hezbollah blamed Israel for killing its operative, declared him a martyr and pledged to avenge his death. The attack near the Lebanese border fence was apparently in retaliation, though Israel had related messages that Mohsen had not been purposely targeted. A Hezbollah cell of three to five operatives crossed the Blue Line a few meters into sovereign Israeli territory. Israeli troops then opened fire at the group, which fled back into Lebanon. Later, Israeli soldiers found explosives and ammunition left behind by the cell, which had apparently planned to set up explosives targeting IDF troops.

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