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Last update - 14:32 13/10/2009
Lebanon: Shell caused blast at Hezbollah official's home
By Avi Issacharoff and Jack Khoury, Haaretz Correspondents
Tags: Lebanon, Israel News 

The Lebanese Army on Tuesday backed Hezbollah's claim that one person was wounded and none killed in an explosion in the southern Lebanese village of Tayr Filsi a day earlier.

According to the Lebanon Army, the explosion at the home of a senior group official was caused by a shell. The United Nations peacekeeping force in Lebanon is still investigating the source of the munitions.

Hezbollah lawmaker Hussein Haj Hassan said the explosion happened in the garage of a Hezbollah member, wounding one person. "We are concerned with finding out the reasons for this explosion," Hassan said.
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President Shimon Peres, meanwhile, warned that Hezbollah was turning Lebanon into a "powderkeg."

"It is not Israel that is endangering Lebanon," said Peres. "We returned to them everything we were supposed to and there is no reason not to have peace with them."

Israel has demanded that the United Nations investigate the explosion at the Hezbollah official's house, which it said proved munitions were being stockpiled in violation of a truce.

Hezbollah has denied that the explosion that rocked the south Lebanon house was serving as a munitions bunker, and immediately rejected media reports that a senior group official was killed in the blast.

An Israel Defense Forces source said the explosion indicated the Iranian-backed guerrilla group Israel fought in a month-long war in 2006 was keeping "banned ammunition" in southern Lebanon.

"The Israeli military has asked UNIFIL to open an investigation," the source said, using the acronym for a United Nations peacekeeping force that has patrolled the troubled Israeli-Lebanese border area for more than three decades.

The cause of the blast appeared to be accidental, reports from Lebanon said. An Israeli military spokeswoman also confirmed Israel had "nothing to do" with the incident.

Lebanese media said that a senior official and at least three others were killed in a blast in a three-story building in the southern Lebanese village of Tayr Filsi, on the southern bank of the Litani River.

Lebanese media named the official as Saeed Nasser and security sources listed his son among the fatalities.

Hezbollah denied that the house was being used as an arms depot and said that the munitions that caused the blast had belonged to the Israel Defense Forces and were left over from the 2006 Second Lebanon War.

The group also said that nobody had been killed in the explosion and only one person wounded.


A UN-mediated truce ending the war of three years ago mandated that a swathe of southern Lebanon be free of weaponry, in exchange for an Israeli troop pullout.

Israel also accused Hezbollah of violating the truce after an explosion in southern Lebanon in July.


A July explosion in an abandoned building in another southern village was said to have been caused by a fire in a Hezbollah arms depot. The militant group said at the time that the building housed ammunition leftover from Israeli attacks on Lebanon.

The Lebanon-based militant group has also accused Israel of responsibility in the 2008 assassination of its deputy secretary general, Imad Mughniyah, in Damascus.

Israel has denied playing any role in Mughniyah's death, but Hezbollah has repeatedly vowed to avenge the assassination.

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      1.   When Israeli hands are clean with respect to 1701... 02:17  |  BBSNews 13/10/09
      2.   UN doesnt care what Arabs violate.UN lied for them 02:19  |  PETER SM 13/10/09
      3.   Half-truth covers up work accident 02:25  |  Born In The USA 13/10/09
      4.   Hezbollah lies......... 03:30  |  Lynn 13/10/09
      5.   Let Gladstone to investigate too............ 04:48  |  Vittorio 13/10/09
      6.   It`s the Mossad. Or the Occupation. 15:55  |  Rory 13/10/09
      7.   Peres is half right 16:16  |  Billy 13/10/09
      8.   Hezbollah`s side of the story is substantiated 17:31  |  someone 13/10/09
      9.   Beirut better than Switzerland 17:34  |  Lebanese 13/10/09
      10.   What a nerve! 17:38  |  Silvienne 13/10/09
      11.   Silvienne 17:50  |  alan 13/10/09
      12.   #9 Lebanese 18:01  |  17 13/10/09
      13.   When BSNews` brain is clean of hate for Israel 18:02  |  SDHD 13/10/09
      14.   Hezbollah using residential areas to store 18:10  |  Gina 13/10/09
      15.   Alan..... 18:33  |  Silvienne 13/10/09
      16.   Refugies in Lebanon and other Arab Countries 19:07  |  CH 13/10/09
      17.   Billy from Beirut 19:13  |  Yakov 13/10/09
      18.   #9 Lebanese....I agree with that one 19:24  |  Lynn 13/10/09
      19.   Fig leaves and 1701 19:44  |  Mark Lincoln 13/10/09
      20.   Silvienne 20:06  |  alan 13/10/09
      21.   Lebanese 22:35  |  Daniela 13/10/09
      22.   BBS or BS News 23:20  |  Dan 13/10/09
      23.   Alan and Silvienne 23:37  |  Murray of Montreal 13/10/09
      24.   Alan..... 00:56  |  Silvienne 14/10/09
      25.   #19 Silvinne - You said it, HOW MANY RULINGS?? 21:29  |  *BEN JABO 14/10/09
      26.   #8 Someone - If you have the picture, post it 21:46  |  *BEN JABO 14/10/09
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