Lebanon demands UN Security Council compel Israel to halt onslaught, withdraw forces

By Wassim Seif El Din

BEIRUT (AA) – Lebanon lodged a new complaint with the UN Security Council on Wednesday to compel Israel to halt its ongoing attacks immediately and withdraw troops from Lebanese territory.

A Foreign Ministry statement said the complaint calls for condemning “Israel’s ongoing aggression on Lebanon and obligating it to implement Resolution 1701."

Adopted on Aug. 11, 2006, the resolution calls for a complete cessation of hostilities between Lebanon and Israel and the establishment of a demilitarized zone between the Blue Line (the boundary between Lebanon and Israel) and the Litani River, allowing only the Lebanese army and UN peacekeeping mission UNIFIL to possess weapons and military equipment in the area.

The ministry denounced “Israel's continued violation of Lebanon’s sovereignty by sea, land, and air, and its targeting of Lebanese army posts, ambulance and relief agencies, and civilians… with indiscriminate shelling of cities and villages.”

It called on the UN Security Council “to condemn the expanded and persistent Israeli hostility against Lebanon and its people, as well as the invasion of its land.”

Israel has mounted a huge air campaign in Lebanon against what it claims are Hezbollah targets since Sept. 23, killing more than 1,500 people and displacing more than 1 million.

The aerial campaign is an escalation from a year of cross-border warfare between Israel and Hezbollah since the start of its offensive on the Gaza Strip, in which Israel has killed nearly 42,400 people, most of them women and children, since a Hamas attack last year.

Israel expanded the conflict on Oct. 1 by launching an incursion into southern Lebanon.

*Writing by Ahmed Asmar