UN defies Israel’s call to withdraw peacekeepers from southern Lebanon

The United Nations has refused to withdraw its peacekeepers from southern Lebanon despite repeated demands from Israel, which has accused the UN of “providing a human shield” to Hezbollah.

The UN insists that its forces, operating under a Security Council mandate, will remain in place even as Israeli military operations intensify in the region .

Tensions between Israel and the UN’s peacekeeping mission, United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), have escalted in recent days with claims Israeli tanks burst into UN base on Sunday.

A UN peacekeeper was also wounded in southern Lebanon on Saturday after being hit by gunfire — the fifth member of the multinational force to be injured in recent days.

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has ordered the UNIFIL to relocate, claiming that their bases were serving as cover for Hezbollah fighters - but the UN has insisted that its presence is crucial for international oversight and stability.

It comes as the UN Refugee Agency reported that 25 per cent of Lebanon was now under Israeli evacuation orders.

On Tuesday, the UN’s human rights office said 22 people, including 12 women and two children, had been killed in an attack on a building in northern Lebanon.

UN peacekeeping chief Jean-Pierre Lacroix told reporters that Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said peacekeepers will remain in all their positions even as Israel has urged the peacekeepers to move three miles north during its ground invasion in Lebanon.

He also confirmed that five UNIFIL peacekeepers had been injured in recent days and that the UN has protested to Israel. Israel has indicated “investigations will be carried out regarding some of these incidents ... and we will see what comes out of this,” he said.Israeli Army spokesman Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani has said that Israel has tried to maintain constant contact with UNIFIL and that any instance of UN forces being harmed will be investigated at “the highest level”.

Mr Netanyahu has called for UNIFIL to heed Israel‘s warnings to evacuate, accusing them of “providing a human shield” to Hezbollah.“We regret the injury to the UNIFIL soldiers, and we are doing everything in our power to prevent this injury. But the simple and obvious way to ensure this is simply to get them out of the danger zone,” he said on Sunday.

On Monday night, the foreign ministers of France, Germany, Italy and the United Kingdom issued a joint statement expressing their “deep concern” over the recent Israeli “attacks on UNIFIL bases”.