A French soldier serving with the United Nations peacekeeping mission in Lebanon has been killed, and three others were wounded in an attack that UNIFIL and French officials said was likely carried out by Hezbollah.
Three other members of the peacekeeping mission were wounded in the attack in the village of Ghandouriyeh in southern Lebanon, UNIFIL said on Saturday, two of them seriously.
UNIFIL noted that initial assessments indicated they came from non-state actors, allegedly Hezbollah, and that an investigation had been launched into what it called “a deliberate attack”.
In calls with Lebanese President Joseph Aoun and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam, French President Emmanuel Macron condemned the “unacceptable attack”, his office said in a statement on Saturday.
Macron also said the evidence so far pointed to the Lebanese armed group and urged the Lebanese government to act against those responsible.
The Iran-aligned armed group rejected the allegations, calling for “exercising caution in issuing judgements regarding the incident”.
“We deny any connection to us with the incident that occurred with UNIFIL forces in the Ghandouriyeh area in Bint Jbeil,” Hezbollah said in a statement.
French Armed Forces Minister Catherine Vautrin said the patrol was ambushed while on a mission to open a route to a UNIFIL post that had been isolated by fighting in the area. The soldier was killed by direct small-arms fire, she said.
Lebanon’s army condemned the shooting and said it had opened an investigation.–Al-Jazeera
