Israel strikes southern Lebanon. The TV announcement: a car hit, a journalist dead and 2 others injured
A Reuters cameraman died and two al-Jazeera journalists were injured on the border between Israel and Lebanon where a car they were traveling in was hit. Issam Abdullah lost his life. Al-Jazeera confirms the wounding of its journalists Carmen Jokhdar and Ellie Brakhaya. One of them, in a video circulating online, appears on the ground and after the attack she screams that she can no longer feel her legs. The attack occurred in the Alma ash-Shaab area.
It is a “very dangerous situation” in Lebanon, “fear is the worst” and “everything is possible”, informed Lebanese sources tell Adnkronos on the day that Iran’s Foreign Minister, Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, is in Beirut. He met Prime Minister Najib Miqati, but also Hezbollah number one, Hasan Nasrallah.
“A shot in southern Lebanon would end up involving the country in the war in Gaza” e “there must be no errors”, the sources say after last Saturday’s attack by Hamas in Israel and the Israeli response with bombings in the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip. While – they observe, specifying that they “have no information” and that it is only “an analysis” – Iran “is trying to stop the normalization between Israel and Saudi Arabia”.
Hezbollah is “absolutely prepared” to intervene against Israel and will act “at the right time”, said the group’s number two, Sheikh Naim Qassem. What Hezbollah will actually do, sources in Lebanon say, is “an Iranian decision.” The scenario ranges from “the status quo, to a cold war in the south, to involvement in the conflict”, they add and tend to exclude “direct involvement in the war”.
The sources insist the agreement in Israel on the creation of an emergency government, on the war cabinet, is a “very strong signal”. And, they say, “fear is the worst” because “the Lebanese Army is not a ‘decision-maker’ in southern Lebanon” and Unifil, the UN force (under chapter VI of the United Nations Charter), “is unfortunately only as an observer”, while there are “factions such as Hezbollah or Islamic Jihad that can always launch rockets against Israeli territory”. And “when there is no real State – they conclude – everything is possible”. In fact, in the last few hours there has been a new intervention by Israeli artillery after a suspected infiltration attempt from southern Lebanon.
Source-www.adnkronos.com