BEIRUT: The Israeli army said on Friday that one of its soldiers was killed in combat with Hezbollah near the border with Lebanon on Thursday.
“St.-Sgt.-Maj. Valeri Chefonov, 33, from Netanya, who served in the 9308 Battalion, 228th Alon Brigade, was killed during the fighting in the north,” the army’s statement read.
Hezbollah and Israel have been trading fire for nearly nine months in hostilities that have played out in parallel to the conflict in Gaza, raising fears of an all-out war between the adversaries.
The head of Hezbollah’s parliamentary bloc, Mohammad Raad, said that Israel was at a stage “where it is unable to wage war on Lebanon, and this is data we know from what we sense and observe in the enemy’s performance, and we are ready for all options.”
BACKGROUND
Hezbollah and Israel have been trading fire for nearly nine months in hostilities that have played out in parallel to the conflict in Gaza, raising fears of an all-out war between the adversaries.
He reiterated his party’s position that “when the negotiations end with a cessation of aggression and a cessation of the war on the Gaza Strip, we will accept what its people and resistance fighters accept, and we will immediately start a ceasefire on our front.”
Coinciding with the continued escalation of aggression between Israel and Hezbollah, Gen. Esmail Qaani, the commander of the Quds Force of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps, visited the front and met with “senior leaders,” according to the Iranian Tasnim agency.
The agency reported on Friday that Qaani stressed that Iran “supports the steadfastness of the people of the Gaza Strip and their resistance as a permanent policy.”
General Esmail Qaani, commander of the Quds Force of Iran's Revolutionary Guard, reportedly visited the frontline in Lebanon's border with Israel amid an exchange of fire between Israeli and Hezbollah forces. (AFP/File)
It did not disclose details about the date and place of the meeting, nor of the people Qaani met.
Also on Friday, several young men near Tyre intercepted a patrol belonging to the UN’s Interim Force in Lebanon, blocking it in with their cars. The patrol had reportedly entered a residential neighborhood without being escorted by a Lebanese Army vehicle.
The incident took place on the eve of the presentation of UNIFIL command’s report on the implementation of UN Resolution 1701, in preparation for the UN Security Council meeting at the end of this month, and a month before the renewal of the UNIFIL mandate in southern Lebanon for another year is due.
UNIFIL Command contacted the Lebanese Army to resolve the issue. According to security reports, the patrol “got lost and the consequences of the incident were quickly dealt with.”
UNIFIL patrols have gone astray more than once in recent months, as a result of Israel’s jamming of internet networks — also experienced at Beirut airport and port and several other areas of Lebanon.
But Hezbollah supporters claim that the patrols are deliberately entering residential neighborhoods. One previous interception in 2022 turned into a bloody confrontation in the Al-Aqbiya area, which resulted in the death of an Irish soldier. The military court is still trying five people accused of the attack, which wounded three other soldiers. One of the detainees was released a few months ago on bail.
In another development, a Lebanese army Humvee was targeted by Israeli machine gun fire from the village of Ghajar near Wazzani on Friday, but no one on board was hit.
Hezbollah, meanwhile, said it had targeted “the espionage equipment at the center for military collection and reconnaissance crews in the Israeli Metula site with guided missiles, which led to its destruction.”
The party also targeted “a group of Israeli soldiers while they were carrying out fortification work in the vicinity of the Hanita site with missile weapons.”
Israeli shelling of border villages ignited fires in the forests of Blida, Mhaibib, and Aainata, reaching Aitaroun, and Israeli warplanes renewed their violation of Lebanese airspace, breaking the sound barrier twice over Matn and Keserwan in Mount Lebanon, while Israeli reconnaissance planes continued flying over the villages of Tyre and Bint Jbeil districts.
Also on Friday, the German Embassy in Lebanon reiterated its request for its citizens “present in Lebanon, despite the travel warning issued and the urgent request to leave Lebanese territory, to register on the Federal Foreign Office’s crisis preparedness list ELEFAND.”
The embassy’s warning coincided with the continued military tension between Hezbollah and the Israeli army on Lebanon’s southern border.
