Israel mourns slain soldier
A Lebanese soldier fired into Israel on Sunday, killing a 31-year-old Israeli.
Shlomi Cohen, a non-commissioned officer from Afula, was patrolling the area near Israel’s ceasefire line with Lebanon – which has mostly been quiet since the Second Lebanon War of 2006.
Israeli military spokesman Peter Lerner called the incident an “outrageous breach of Israel’s sovereignty.” He said: “We will not tolerate aggression against the State of Israel, and maintain the right to exercise self-defence against perpetrators of attacks against Israel and its civilians.”
After Cohen was hit, the Israeli military saw what it believed to be further “suspicious movement” in Lebanon and shot two Lebanese soldiers. Lerner said that these two soldiers were thought to pose an “immediate threat.”
Lebanon is the main base of the extremist Hezbollah, which holds more than 10 per cent of the seats in the country’s parliament and which has a very strong militia.
Antagonism towards the Jewish State is also very high outside of Hezbollah, and initial assessments indicate that the attacker in Sunday’s incident was actually a member of Lebanon’s official military, the Lebanese Armed Forces, acting alone. According to Lebanese media he has since turned himself in to authorities in Beirut.
Israel has submitted an official complaint to the UNIFIL, the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon. UNIFIL spokesman Andrea Tenenti told The AJN: “We are in contact with our counterparts in Israel and Lebanon, trying to establish the facts of what happened.”
As of press time, the two armies had held one UNIFIL-mediated meeting, during which UNIFIL called on both sides to ensure that it remains an “isolated incident.”
Earlier this month a senior member of the IDF’s Northern Command said that his forces are keeping a close eye on Lebanon, and take the threat of Hezbollah particularly seriously.
“UN Resolution 1701 forbade Hezbollah [from building up a weapons arsenal], but it still holds weapons and acts secretly with great effort to get weapons,” he commented. “There are houses where the family lives on the first floor and the basement is a weapons depot … If Hamas is digging terrorist tunnels, I believe that Hezbollah, which has more funds and better capabilities, is doing exactly the same.”
NATHAN JEFFAY
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