IDF told not to fire on unarmed observers, says UN

Despite repeated calls by a United Nations commander, by senior officials in the region and in UN headquarters in New York, the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) made a direct aerial strike on a well-marked bunker in southern Lebanon, killing three unarmed UN observers, with a fourth presumed dead. “I think the attack on UN positions and UN personnel is inexcusable and unacceptable. I think the briefing by the Secretariat is very clear. It sends a clear message,” said Chinese Ambassador Wang Guangya. “My government has made a number of demarches to ensure that the UN presence there has to be protected. But after all these demarches, things happened.” The four unarmed peacekeepers, Chinese, Finnish, Canadian, and Austrian observers, were part of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL). Three bodies have been recovered and the fourth is feared dead after an aerial bomb impacted directly on their patrol base near Khiam, southern Lebanon at 19.30 on Tuesday. “Throughout the day, UNIFIL had protested, directly to the IDF each of these incidents of firing close to Patrol Base Khiam,” said Jane Holl Lute, UN Assistant Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations in her briefing to the council. Mark Malloch Brown, the UN Deputy Secretary-General, and UN peacekeeping officials made “half a dozen” telephone calls from the UN Secretariat in New York to Israeli Ambassador to the UN Dan Gillerman and his deputy over the course of the six-hour firing, according to a senior UN official. “There was a direct request from the mission [in Lebanon] that we urgently request an abatement,” so Malloch Brown was enlisted to make the telephone calls, according to a senior UN official. The Israeli ambassador “expressed concern and reiterated that the UN was not a target,” said the official. The reason for the bombing given to the UN by the IDF on the ground was “aerial preparation for a ground operation,” the UN official said. Lute noted in her briefing to the council that even after the IDF attack, when the bunker was reduced to rubble, “Firing continued during the rescue operation despite repeated requests to the IDF for an abatement.” Some assurances had been given over the phone by Israel while the rescue operation was in progress that rescuers would not be fired upon, a senior UN official said. Twenty-one strikes by IDF forces within 300 meters of the patrol base occurred, as well as 12 artillery rounds that fell within 100 meters of the base, four of which hit the base directly, according to Lute. She noted that the Hezbollah militia did not fire on the base at this time, according to all information available. Tuesday evening UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan issued a strong statement from Rome, Italy, condemning the “apparently deliberate targeting by Israeli Defence Forces of a UN Observer post in Southern Lebanon.” “Furthermore, General Alain Pelligrini, the UN Force Commander in south Lebanon, had been in repeated contact with Israeli officers throughout the day on Tuesday, stressing the need to protect that particular UN position from attack,” said Annan. On Wednesday, Deputy UN Spokesperson Marie Okabe indicated that Annan used the word “deliberate” in order to describe the attack. “With the kind of attack that did take place, somebody had to have targeted it in order for it to be hit. He was not accusing anybody or pointing directly at any person, but deliberate had to do with the kind of strike and target.” Annan called for an immediate investigation by the Israeli government into this “very disturbing incident,” and suggested that the UN take part. The UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations will be conducting its own investigation by board of inquiry. “I…demand that any further attack on U.N positions and personnel must stop,” said Annan. On Wednesday, the Secretary-General told reporters in Rome he had spoken to Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and accepted Olmert’s belief that the six-hour air and artillery shelling was a “mistake.” “He has expressed his deep sorrow at what happened, and we accept that,” said Annan. The military observers are the latest UNIFIL casualties since the recent outbreak of hostilities. On 17 July, a UNIFIL staff member and his wife were killed during an aerial bombardment in Tyre. Five soldiers and one military observer have also been wounded as a result of firing. Security Council resolution 1502, drafted in 2003, outlines measures aimed at improving the safety of UN and associated personnel. A key provision relates to attacks against members of United Nations operations, and calls for “the establishment of such attacks as crimes punishable by law and the prosecution or extradition of offenders".