Lebanon ‘house’ damaged by Israel a Catholic convent
JERUSALEM—A French charity on Saturday said a “religious building” in south Lebanon that the Israeli military confirmed it had damaged was a Catholic convent, as the group denounced what it called the “deliberate” targeting of a place of worship.
The military said troops operating in the village of Yaroun had damaged “one of the houses located in a religious compound” while they were dismantling a “terrorist infrastructure” in the area.
According to French Catholic charity L’Oeuvre d’Orient, Israeli troops had “destroyed” the convent belonging to the Salvatorian Sisters, a Greek-Catholic religious order and affiliate of L’Oeuvre.
But the Israeli military’s Arabic-language spokesperson, Col. Avichay Adraee, said on X: “There were no visible signs indicating this was a religious building.”
“Once clear identifying features were observed on another building in the compound, the forces acted to prevent any further damage to the compound,” said Adraee, who also said there were multiple rocket attacks launched by Hezbollah from within the compound.
L’Oeuvre said it “strongly condemns this deliberate act of destruction against a place of worship, as well as the systematic demolition of homes in southern Lebanon aimed at preventing the return of civilian populations.”
Christ statue, nun attacked
Israel’s foreign ministry denied the site had been destroyed, posting on X that it was “intact and safe,” along with a photograph of a two-story house.
The incident comes days after the military detained two soldiers for desecrating a statue of Jesus Christ in the Christian village of Debl in south Lebanon, near the border with Israel.
A photograph that went viral on social media showed a soldier using a sledgehammer to strike the statue’s head.
Last Wednesday, a man was caught on police video attacking a French Catholic nun in Jerusalem’s Old City.
Israeli police said the suspect, 36, was detained “on suspicion of a racially motivated attack” near David’s Tomb, a holy site outside Zion’s Gate on the Old City’s southern side.
The video showed the nun bruised and the attacker wearing tzitzit, a fringed undergarment worn by some observant Jewish men.
Israeli police said on social media: “In a city sacred to Jews, Christians, and Muslims alike, we remain committed to protecting all communities and ensuring those responsible for violence are held accountable.”
Flash point
Also posting on social media, Olivier Poquillon, director of the French School of Biblical and Archaeological Research, called the attack an “act of sectarian violence.” He said the nun was a researcher at the school.
It was the latest incident targeting Christians in Jerusalem. The Old City in Israel-annexed east Jerusalem is a centuries-old walled enclave that is home to some of the holiest sites for Jews, Christians and Muslims.
It is a flash point for tensions as access and ownership to the sites are deeply entangled with the historic and political claims that lie at the heart of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Religious groups have documented a rise in acts of harassment and violence against Christian pilgrims and clergy as well as Palestinian Christian residents, including assaults and spitting, often by ultra-Orthodox Jewish yeshiva students.
Attacks amid ceasefire
Meanwhile, Israel has kept up deadly strikes on Lebanon despite a ceasefire that was supposed to take effect on April 17, after more than six weeks of Israeli attacks targeting Hezbollah.
The ceasefire text, however, also grants Israel the right to act against “planned, imminent or ongoing attacks.”
Israeli soldiers are operating inside a “Yellow Line” running some 10 kilometers deep inside Lebanon’s border, where they are carrying out wide-scale detonations and demolitions of buildings.
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