UN Security Council Condemns Explosion in Southern Lebanon

Today, the United Nations Security Council issued a statement in response to the explosion in southern Lebanon that occurred this past week.

Shlomo Shamir in Haaretz:

For the first time ever, the United Nations on Thursday accused Hezbollah of violating the UN-brokered cease-fire that ended the 2006 Second Lebanon war, fought between Israel and the Shi'ite militant organization.

The UN's Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations, Alain Le Roy, said Hezbollah had been operating a weapons depot in south Lebanon that was the site of an explosion last week.

He told member states there was solid evidence that the cache belonged to Hezbollah, but added that it was not known whether the weapons had been stockpiled there before or after Resolution 1701, which called for the cease-fire, was passed.

Resolution 1701, which was accepted by both Israel and Hezbollah, called for the disarmament of all armed groups in Lebanon.

Writing for the Jerusalem Post, Yaakov Katz reports that the IDF was outraged by the explosion in southern Lebanon. Israeli and Lebanese officials dispute whether or not the weapons that caused the explosion were placed in the southern Lebanese village before 2006, prior to the cease-fire:

"This is a major violation of resolution 1701," one Israeli official said. "The weaponry was stored inside a village and is proof of our longstanding claim that Hizbullah uses civilian infrastructure to hide its weaponry."

Contrary to Lebanese media reports which claimed that the cache was hidden in the village before the Second Lebanon War in 2006, Israeli defense officials said that the weaponry was recently placed inside the storehouse.

According to the officials, the cache was hidden in a storehouse inside the village and contained dozens of 122mm Katyusha rockets as well as high-powered machine guns. Some of the rockets reportedly flew into the sky.

The blast took place at 10:30 a.m. Tuesday, and for the first few hours, Hizbullah sealed off the area and refused to grant UNIFIL or the Lebanese army access. IDF sources said that the clearing of the home and the unexploded ordinance had taken over 24 hours.

The sources said the IDF had been aware prior to the explosion that the home was being used as a storehouse for weapons. Several months before the explosion, an IDF aircraft captured footage of several senior Hizbullah operatives entering an underground tunnel near the house and reappearing from an exit 700 m. away.

"This house was connected to an entire underground network that was built right under the noses of UNIFIL and the Lebanese army," one IDF officer said. "This is a major violation of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1701."

In addition to the 122-mm. rockets, IDF ballistic experts said it was likely that the home also contained mortar shells and additional types of ammunition.