Türkiye condemns Israel’s attacks targeting the U.N. peacekeeping force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), the Foreign Ministry said late Thursday.
Israeli attacks against the UNIFIL in recent days, amid its war on Gaza and the cross-border clashes with Hezbollah militants in Lebanon, have wounded U.N. personnel and prompted international alarm.
The UNIFIL said earlier Thursday that its headquarters in the southern Lebanese city of Naqoura and two nearby sites had been struck by Israeli forces.
On Thursday morning, an Israeli Merkava tank fired on an observation tower, striking it directly and causing two peacekeepers to fall, sending them to hospital with minor injuries, the UNIFIL said in a statement.
In New York, Israel's U.N. Ambassador Danny Danon said Israel recommends the UNIFIL relocate north in Lebanon "to avoid danger as fighting intensifies."
"Israel's attacks on U.N. forces, following its massacres against civilians in Gaza, the West Bank, and Lebanon is a manifestation of its perception that its crimes go unpunished," Türkiye's Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
"The international community is obliged to ensure that Israel abides by international law," it said.
It added that Türkiye contributed to the UNIFIL Maritime Task Force with one corvette and five personnel and that it will continue to bolster all initiatives that aim to foster peace in the region in line with international law.
Israel has mounted massive airstrikes across Lebanon against what it claims are Hezbollah targets since Sept. 23, killing at least 1,323 people, injuring over 3,700 others, and displacing more than 1.2 million people.
The aerial campaign is an escalation from a year of cross-border warfare between Israel and Hezbollah since the start of its offensive on the Gaza Strip, in which Israel has killed over 42,000 people, most of them women and children, since a Hamas attack last year.
Despite international warnings that the Mideast was on the brink of a regional war amid Israel's relentless attacks on Gaza and Lebanon, it expanded the conflict on Oct. 1 by launching a ground incursion into southern Lebanon.
Türkiye has been fiercely critical of Israel's offensives in Gaza and Lebanon. It has halted all trade with Israel, applied to join a genocide case against Israel at the World Court and repeatedly called for an end to Western support of Israel along with international measures to stop its assaults.
