BEIRUT, (PIC)
Israeli forces kidnapped on Thursday a Lebanese citizen working for the UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) in southern Lebanon, after Israeli vehicles advanced through Wadi al-Hujayr into the town of Qantara in southern Lebanon in a new violation of the ceasefire agreement with Hezbollah, bringing the number of violations by the Israeli army to more than 300 since the agreement came into effect on November 27.
The Lebanese National News Agency said the Israeli army vehicles advanced, through Wadi al-Hujeir, in southern Lebanon and carried out extensive combing operations with heavy machine guns, as Israeli forces kidnapped “the citizen Husam Fawaz from the town of Tebnin, while he was heading to his workplace at the Indonesian Battalion Center affiliated with UNIFIL in the town of Adshit al-Qusayr.”
It added that Israeli reconnaissance aircraft and drones flew in “the airspace of central and western districts, especially over the Naqoura in the south, to Bint Jbeil, Taloussa and Qantara as well as Wadi al-Hujeir and al-Saluqi areas in the east.”
For its part, UNIFIL said in a press statement on Thursday that “any actions that threaten the fragile cessation of hostilities must stop,” adding that Israel and Lebanon affirmed “their commitment to the full implementation of UN Security Council Resolution 1701.
“To address outstanding issues, both parties are called upon to benefit from the newly established mechanism as agreed upon in the understanding”, UNIFIL said.
It stressed the need for the withdrawal of the Israeli army on time, the deployment of the Lebanese Armed Forces in southern Lebanon, and the full implementation of Resolution 1701 as a comprehensive path towards peace.
The UNFIL stressed that “peacekeeping soldiers will continue to perform their assigned tasks, including monitoring all violations of Resolution 1701 and reporting them to the UN Security Council.”
