The United Nations’ human rights office has called for an independent probe into an Israeli airstrike that hit an apartment building in northern Lebanon on Monday. A reported 22 people were killed in the strike on the Christian-majority village of Aitou.
Israel has not commented, but a BBC news story suggests that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) might have been targeting a Hezbollah operative in Aitou. Elie Alwan, the owner of the building that was struck, told reporters that a car came to the house on Monday, apparently to deliver cash, when the airstrike hit.
“Israeli airstrikes on members of Hezbollah in the areas where the group usually operates have pushed its members to other parts of the country, creating fears across Lebanon that Israeli targets could be anywhere,” the BBC said.
Alwan said the building was being rented to people who had been displaced from the south of Lebanon, where Israel began a military operation against Hezbollah last month. [Photo above shows a statue of St. Charbel, a popular Lebanese saint, near the site of the airstrike.]
The Lebanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced on Wednesday that Lebanon submitted a new complaint to the U.N. Security Council regarding the "Israeli aggression against Lebanon during the period from October 3 to 14," L’Orient Today reported.
It was the second complaint lodged this week by Lebanon's Permanent Mission to the UN, and its third since mid-September and the start of the Israeli escalation. On Monday, a complaint concerning the effects of Israeli aggression on Lebanon's education sector had already been submitted to the Security Council.
According to the ministry's statement published by the state-run National News Agency (NNA), Lebanon condemned "Israel's continued violation of its sovereignty by sea, land and air, and its targeting of Lebanese army posts, ambulance and relief organizations, and civilians not participating in hostilities by indiscriminate shelling of towns and villages."
Among the examples the ministry gave was the airstrike on the village of Aitou.
Nowhere to run?
Jeremy Laurence, spokesman for the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), said that reportedly 12 women and two children were among the victims of the airstrike.
“We have real concerns with respect to [International Humanitarian Law], so the laws of war and principles of distinction, proportion and proportionality. In this case, [OHCHR] would call for a prompt, independent and thorough investigation into this incident,” Laurence said Tuesday.
Lebanon condemned Israel's surprise "airstrikes in cities, villages and populated neighborhoods, with no regard for the lives of civilians," L'Orient Today, a Lebanese newspaper, said.
Since the Israeli military escalated its offensive against Hezbollah fighters in Lebanon last month, deadly rocket attacks into Israel have not stopped. The UN refugee agency, UNHCR, reported that the death toll in Lebanon is now more than 2,200 since the outbreak of the war in Gaza in October 2023.
Over 10,000 people have also been injured amid Israeli airstrikes and Israeli evacuation orders that have left more than 25% of the country “under a direct Israeli military evacuation order,” a UNHCR official told journalists in Geneva.
Some 1.2 million people have now been displaced across Lebanon, according to the Lebanese government, while the UN aid coordination office, OCHA, warned that all those impacted “are enduring the worst humanitarian crisis in decades.”
“Violence is pushing an already overwhelmed health system to the brink, with devastating impacts on care. Attacks on health facilities are a violation of international humanitarian law. They must end now,” OCHA said in an online post.
“People are heeding these calls to evacuate and they're fleeing with almost nothing,” said Rema Jamous Imseis, UNHCR Director for the Middle East. “Many of them are being forced out into the open; they're sleeping under the skies as they try to find their way towards safety and support.”
Desperate scenes have also been reported on Lebanon’s border with Syria, where more than 283,000 people have now crossed into northern Syria “seeking safety, fleeing Israeli airstrikes,” the UNHCR official said.
Israel says it is necessary to take on Hezbollah in order for residents of the north of Israel to be able to return to their homes.
