Israeli forces kill 22 Lebanese in south on pullout deadline
- 26 Jan 2025
Israeli army fire killed 22 people in south Lebanon on Sunday including a soldier, health officials said, as residents tried to return home on the day Israel was meant to withdraw under a truce deal.
The withdrawal deadline is part of a ceasefire agreement reached two months ago that ended Israel's war with Hizbollah.
The deal that took effect on Nov.27 said the Lebanese army was to deploy alongside United Nations peacekeepers in the south as the Israeli army withdrew over a 60-day period that ends on Sunday.
The parties have traded blame for the delay in implementing the agreement, and on Friday Israel said it would keep troops across the border in south Lebanon beyond the pullout date.
Lebanon's health ministry said on Sunday that Israeli forces opened fire on "citizens who were trying to return to their villages that are still under (Israeli) occupation." It said 22 people including six women and a soldier were killed and 124 more wounded.
The Lebanese army also announced the soldier's death and said another had been wounded. The Israeli military said in a statement that its "troops operating in southern Lebanon fired warning shots to remove threats" where "suspects were identified approaching the troops." It added that "a number of suspects... that posed an imminent threat to the troops were apprehended."
AFP journalists said convoys of vehicles carrying hundreds of people, some flying yellow Hizbollah flags, were trying to get to several border villages.
"We will return to our villages and the Israeli enemy will leave," even if it costs lives, said Ali Harb, a 27-year-old trying to go to Kfar Kila.
A joint statement from the UN special coordinator for Lebanon, Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert, and the head of the UNIFIL peacekeeping mission acknowledged that "conditions are not yet in place for the safe return of citizens to their villages."
'Threats and warnings'
An AFP correspondent saw hundreds of people gather for a collective prayer on a main road in the border town of Bint Jbeil, followed by a march to some nearby villages. Residents could also be seen heading on foot and by motorbike towards the devastated border town of Mays Al Jabal, where Israeli troops are still stationed. Some held up portraits of former Hizbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, slain in an Israeli attack in late September, while women dressed in black carried photos of family members killed in the war.
Israeli military spokesman Avichay Adraee had issued a message earlier on Sunday to residents of more than 60 villages in southern Lebanon telling them not to return.
Speaking from the border town of Aita Al Shaab, Hizbollah lawmaker Hassan Fadlallah hailed in a television appearance "the return of residents in spite of the threats and warnings."
Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, the former army chief who took office earlier this month, called on residents to keep a cool head and "trust the Lebanese army," which he said wanted "to ensure your safe return to your homes and villages."
Israeli forces have left coastal areas of southern Lebanon but are still present in areas further east.
The ceasefire deal stipulates that Hizbollah pull back its forces north of the Litani River — about 30 kilometres from the border — and dismantle any remaining military infrastructure in the south. But Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said on Friday that the "agreement has not yet been fully enforced by the Lebanese state," so the military's withdrawal would continue beyond the Sunday deadline.
Truce holding
Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati called Sunday for the backers of the ceasefire agreement — a group that includes the United States and France — "to force the Israeli enemy to withdraw."
French President Emmanuel Macron told Netanyahu in a telephone call on Sunday to "withdraw his forces still present in Lebanon" and stressed the importance of restoring Lebanese state authority nationwide, Macron's office said.
Agence France-Presse