Israel’s military said Tuesday an anti-tank missile fired by Lebanon’s Hezbollah group wounded nine soldiers as they rescued a civilian who was injured in another cross-border strike.

One of the soldiers was in a “serious condition,” the army said, after the group was hit when rescuing the civilian injured by an anti-tank missile fired from Lebanon amid the Gaza war.

That missile had hit a Greek Orthodox church in Iqrit, the army said in an earlier statement, referring to an abandoned Palestinian Christian village whose inhabitants were forced to leave during the 1948 war and creation of Israel.

The army accused the Iran-backed Hezbollah group of constant firing at Israeli “civilian and religious sites.”

Israeli military spokesman Daniel Hagari said Hezbollah was “committing war crimes by indiscriminately attacking places of worship.”

On November 20, Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency (NNA) reported that “Israeli artillery shelling” had targeted the Saint George Church in the border village of Yarun, causing “major damage.”

The frontier between Lebanon and Israel has seen escalating exchanges of fire, mainly between the Israeli army and Hezbollah, since the Israel-Hamas war began on October 7, raising fears of a broader conflict.

Hezbollah, which on Tuesday announced the death of two of its fighters, says it is acting in support of Hamas.

Since hostilities began, more than 150 people have been killed on the Lebanese side, most of them Hezbollah combatants but also more than a dozen civilians, three of them journalists, according to an AFP tally.

On Tuesday, Israeli bombardment wounded two people in the town of Tulin, around 10 kilometers (six miles) from the border, according to the NNA, which also reported Israeli strikes in other areas near the frontier.

Hezbollah claimed a series of attacks against Israeli troops and positions. In one attack, the group said it fired missiles at an Israeli barracks.

“Hezbollah is risking the stability of the region for the sake of Hamas,” the Israeli military’s Hagari said.

On the Israeli side, at least four civilians and nine soldiers have been killed since October 7, according to figures given by the army.

The ninth soldier died from wounds suffered earlier, the military said Tuesday.

Source: Arab News

BDST: 1025 HRS, DEC 27, 2023
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