Shell Hits UN Peacekeeping HQ In South Lebanon: Spokesman

A shell hit the headquarters of the UN peacekeeping mission in south Lebanon on Saturday, its spokesman said in the second such incident since the Israel-Hamas war erupted in Gaza.

"A shell hit inside the base" in Naqura, said Andrea Tenenti, spokesperson for the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon, indicating there were "no injuries but some damage".

He said UNIFIL was seeking to verify who fired the shell.

A Lebanese military source, who spoke on condition of anonymity as they were not authorised to talk to the media, said "an Israeli shell penetrated the cement wall" around the UNIFIL headquarters.
The shell did not explode, a UNIFIL statement said, adding that "several of our other positions have also sustained damage in the past three weeks" and urging "all parties to immediately cease fire".

On October 15, UNIFIL said its headquarters was struck by a rocket but nobody was hurt.

Since October 7, when Hamas gunmen poured across the Gaza border into Israel, killing more than 1,400 people, mostly civilians, and taking 229 hostages, Israel has been relentlessly bombarding the strip, killing more than 7,700 people mostly civilians, Gaza's health ministry says.

The violence has caused tensions to soar along the Lebanon-Israel border where there have been ongoing exchanges of fire between Israel and the Iran-backed Hezbollah, a Hamas ally.

Those exchanges have killed at least 58 people in Lebanon, according to an AFP tally, mostly Hezbollah combatants but also four civilians, including Reuters journalist Issam Abdallah.
The unrest has displaced nearly 29,000 people across Lebanon, according to the International Organization for Migration.