BEIRUT (AP) — An Israeli drone strike in southern Lebanon killed five people Sunday, including three children, Lebanon’s Health Ministry said. Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri said four of the killed, the three children as well as their father, held U.S. citizenship.
Two others were wounded, including the mother in the family.
Officials at the U.S. Embassy in Beirut could not immediately be reached for comment.
Since a ceasefire agreement was reached in November to end Israel’s monthslong war with the Hezbollah militant group, Israel has continued to strike southern and eastern Lebanon almost daily.
Under the Washington-brokered ceasefire, both the militant Hezbollah group and Israel were supposed to withdraw their forces from southern Lebanon and halt strikes against each other. Israeli forces have continue to occupy five Lebanese hilltop points by the border.
The Israeli military did not immediately comment on Sunday’s strikes, but frequently says it is targeting Hezbollah militants or infrastructure in the tiny country’s battered southern region. Hezbollah has only claimed firing across the border once since the ceasefire, but Israel says the militant group is trying to rebuild its capabilities.
Lebanese officials have warned that the ongoing strikes risk the country’s recent efforts to disarm the group and further worsen its shaky security situation. Hezbollah has maintained that it no longer has a military presence south of the Litani River, and has refused to speak of disarmament without Israel stopping its attacks and withdrawing from southern Lebanese territory.
President Joseph Aoun, who earlier landed in New York ahead of the United Nations General Assembly, condemned the strike and called on the international community to pressure Israel to stop. Aoun, alongside the Lebanese government under Prime Minister Nawaf Salam, endorsed an agreement last month that would gradually disarm Hezbollah.
“There is no peace above the blood of our children,” said Aoun in a statement from his office.
The monthslong war between Hezbollah and Israel killed some 4,000 people in Lebanon and displaced residents across southern and eastern Lebanon.
Prime Minister Salam, who like Aoun, vowed upon his appointment earlier this year to disarm all non-state groups, said the strike was a “message of intimidation targeting our people returning to their villages in the south.”
“The states sponsoring the cessation of hostilities agreement must exert maximum pressure on Israel to immediately halt its attacks, withdraw from occupied Lebanese territories, and release prisoners,” said Salam in a post on X, formerly Twitter.
Hezbollah officials say the ongoing strikes justify their refusal to give up their arms, and claim that the ceasefire agreement and monitoring mechanism with the United States, France, and United Nations peacekeeping forces is ineffective.
“They have proven once again that resorting to official protection under international auspices has not provided them with security and stability,” said Hezbollah parliamentarian Hassan Fadlallah. “All these attacks and killings perpetrated by the enemy will not push our people to abandon their land and rights, and they will only strengthen the people of the south’s adherence to the option of resistance.”
