Lebanese army says Israel targeted Hezbollah-linked ‘environmental group’

In the Lebanese government’s first official statement on border tensions last night, the Lebanese military claims that Israel targeted a Hezbollah-affiliated “environmental group” with rockets.

“Helicopters belonging to the Israeli enemy targeted centers of the [Hezbollah-affiliated] Green Without Borders environmental group inside Lebanese territories, by launching 3 rockets which targeted the outlying area of Ramya, and 8 missiles which landed outside the town of Aita al-Sha’ab,” the Lebanese army says.

The Lebanese army further says that Israel launched 117 flare shells and about 100 shells, some of them explosive and the rest phosphorous in the outlying areas of the towns: Mays al-Jabal, Hula, Maroun al-Ras and Aitaroun inside Lebanese territory.

Some of the shells ignited fires in forests in the area, as well as causing material damage to a house and a goat shed.

Israel has long accused Green Without Borders of serving as a front for Hezbollah’s military wing. The United Nations and its peacekeeping troops in Lebanon UNIFIL have also acknowledged a connection between the two, including the fact that an attack against Israel by the terror group last September was apparently launched from a GWB site in southern Lebanon.

— Aaron Boxerman, Judah Ari Gross