Lebanese Military Fires on Israeli Jets

No Hits Reported, But Tensions Rise After Months of Relative Calm

Tensions along the Israeli Lebanon border are rising again, after a period of relative calm, following the latest Israeli overflight of the southern Lebanese region, in which Lebanese military forces opened fire on the planes.

Israel has conducted several overflights of the southern portion of Lebanon since the end of the 2006 invasion, though such flights are explicitly forbidden by the cease-fire resolution. This appears to be the first time Lebanese forces fired on them, however.

The Lebanese military insists it didn’t actually hit any of the Israeli warplanes, but said it did force them to climb to a higher altitude before they eventually returned across the border. The UN forces monitoring the ceasefire slammed the Israeli incursion.

In July 2006, Israeli forces invaded Lebanon following a Hezbollah attack on an Israeli patrol near the border. The fighting left 44 Israeli civilians killed and several hundred Lebanese civilians killed, though the Lebanese military did not actually take any part in the war.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.