(26 Jan 2025)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Tibnine, South Lebanon – 25 January 2025
1. Various of UNIFIL soldiers from the Nepali Battalion boarding their armoured vehicle
2. Various of UNIFIL soldier driving the armoured vehicle
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Mays al-Jabal, South Lebanon – 25 January 2025
3. Various of extensive destruction in buildings and infrastructure in Mays al-Jabal village, with UNIFIL vehicles passing through the rubble
4. Various of Nepali UN soldiers exiting their armoured vehicle upon arriving at the UN Nepali Base in Mays al-Jabal
5. Various of Nepali UN soldiers taking up positions
6. SOUNDBITE (English) Major Dinesh Bhandari, officer in UNIFIL’s Nepalese battalion:
“We suffered a lot of damage. Luckily, no human casualties. But as you have seen we have one armoured vehicle, and four light vehicles were damaged during the war and one prefabricated building was completely destroyed. Luckily, we were in the bunker at that time, so we haven’t suffered any human casualty.”
7. Various of Nepali UN soldiers watching with binoculars
8. SOUNDBITE (English) Major Dinesh Bhandari- officer in UNIFIL’s Nepalese battalion:
“The de-conflicting mechanism, they are working for this (ceasefire agreement). Till now we did not get any information, but we hope that all the authorities and the IDF will stick to the agreement and the LAF (Lebanese Armed Forces) to deployed, redeploy in their whole area and they need to stick to the agreement.”
9. Female Nepali UN soldiers standing near armoured vehicle
10. Nepali soldiers standing near raised dirt blockade erected by Israeli Forces
STORYLINE:
A day before the deadline for the first phase of an agreement that ended the war between Israel and the Hezbollah militant group, a team from the Associated Press accompanied a UNIFIL peacekeeping force on a trip to border towns in south Lebanon.
In the village of Mays al-Jabal, no residents were left in that town, and the vast majority of the buildings seen by The Associated Press, were reduced to rubble or pancaked following intense Israeli shelling and airstrikes, following by clashes during its ground invasion.
The few that stood have their walls blown out and are badly damaged.
The piles of rubble and debris on the road make it impossible for civilian cars to enter the town that once was home to a few thousand people.
It is similar in neighbouring towns, including Blida and Aytaroun, where almost all the structures have fallen to mounds of rubble and no residents have returned.
In Mays al-Jabal, peacekeepers from the Nepalese battalion watched in their position along the UN-mandated Blue Line, as an Israeli jet flew overhead following the sound of what they said was an Israeli controlled demolition of a building.
The peacekeepers tried to appeal to move but were not authorised to do so.
“There is still a lot of IDF (Israeli Defense Forces) activity going on in the area,” said Major Dinesh Bhandari of UNIFIL’s Nepalese battalion in Mays al-Jabal, overlooking the Blue Line.
“We are waiting for the deconfliction and then we will support to deploy the LAF (Lebanese Armed Forces) in that position.”
When asked about weapons belonging to Hezbollah, Bhandari added that they had found weapons, munitions, and mines in some structures during their patrols.
Israel says it has been taking down remaining infrastructure left by the Hezbollah militant group, which has a strong military and political presence in the south.
Some 112-thousand Lebanese remain displaced, out of over one million displaced during the war.
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