BEIRUT: Lebanon condemned an Israeli “aggression” on Sunday after two drones targeted the Beirut stronghold of the Hezbollah, warning of further regional tensions. Hezbollah, considered a terrorist organisation by Israel and the United States, is a major political actor in Lebanon and a key backer of the Damascus regime in war-torn Syria. The early morning incident in south Beirut came hours after Israel said it had conducted air strikes in neighbouring Syria to prevent an Iranian force from launching an attack on the Jewish state.
A war monitor said the air raids in the southeast of Damascus killed five fighters, including two Hezbollah members and an Iranian.
The movement and Israel have upped their belligerent rhetoric in recent months, after fighting several wars, the last of them in 2006.
Lebanon’s army said “two drones belonging to the Israeli enemy violated Lebanese airspace... over the southern suburbs of Beirut”, a Hezbollah stronghold in the capital.
“The first fell while the second exploded in the air causing material damage,” he said.
A Hezbollah spokesman, Mohamed Afif, insisted his movement did not shoot down either of the two drones, but said the second aircraft had damaged a Hezbollah media centre in a residential building.
It “was laden with explosives and exploded causing huge damage to the media centre”, Afif said, adding that shards from shattered window panes had caused “minor injuries”.
‘THREAT TO
REGIONAL STABILITY’
“The first drone did not explode and it is now in the possession of Hezbollah which is analysing it.” He said the drone had a target, but that it had not yet been determined. Security forces are deployed in the area of the incident.
The Israeli army declined to comment on the Lebanese claim about the drones, but Israeli commentators have suggested the drones could be Iranian.
“Another possibility is that the... drones that fell were not Israeli, but rather Iranian,” military correspondent Amos Harel wrote in Haaretz newspaper.
Lebanon’s President Michel Aoun said the drone incursion targeted “stability and peace in Lebanon and the region”.
Prime Minister Saad Hariri condemned a “blatant attack on Lebanon’s sovereignty”.
“This new aggression... forms a threat to regional stability and an attempt to push the situation towards more tension,” he said.
Hariri also charged that it was in violation of UN Security Council Resolution 1701 that ended the 2006 war between Israel and Hezbollah.
That 33-day war killed 1,200 people in Lebanon, mostly civilians, and 160 in Israel.
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo later Sunday called Hariri to stress the “necessity to avoid any escalation”, the premier’s office said. — AFP
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