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Two United Nations peacekeepers were killed Monday when an explosion destroyed their vehicle in southern Lebanon, the UN Interim Force in Lebanon said, compounding a wave of deadly incidents that has now claimed three blue helmets in as many days.
UNIFIL said the blast occurred near Bani Hayyan, leaving a third peacekeeper severely injured and a fourth with lighter wounds. "Two UNIFIL peacekeepers were tragically killed in south Lebanon today, when an explosion of unknown origin destroyed their vehicle near Bani Hayyan," the force said in a statement, adding that it had launched an investigation. The nationalities of the victims were not immediately disclosed.
The deaths came less than 24 hours after a separate incident Sunday in which an Indonesian peacekeeper was killed when a projectile struck a UNIFIL position near Adchit al-Qusayr. Indonesia's foreign ministry confirmed the deceased was one of its citizens, with three others injured by what it described as indirect artillery fire.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres condemned the Sunday killing and warned that "there will need to be accountability," recalling that attacks on peacekeepers are grave violations of international humanitarian law and may amount to war crimes.
The latest fatalities mark a sharp deterioration in conditions for the roughly 10,000-strong force deployed along the Blue Line, the demarcation boundary separating Israel and Lebanon. Lebanon was pulled back into active conflict when Hezbollah fired rockets at Israel on March 2 in solidarity with Tehran, two days after Iran was struck by Israeli and American forces.
On March 6, Ghana's armed forces reported that the headquarters of its UN peacekeeping battalion was struck, leaving two soldiers critically injured. Israel's military later acknowledged its tank fire had hit the UN position that day, saying its troops had been responding to anti-tank missile fire from Hezbollah. Also on Sunday, a Polish member of a joint Irish-Polish battalion sustained minor injuries after a roadside device detonated beneath their patrol vehicle.
The violence fits a broader pattern that predates the current escalation. In November 2025, an Israeli Merkava tank fired on a UNIFIL patrol inside Lebanese territory, with shells landing only metres from the peacekeepers.
The month prior, an Israeli drone dropped a grenade near a UN patrol at Kfar Kila, moments before an Israeli tank opened fire toward them. UN Special Rapporteur Morris Tidball-Binz said those incidents formed "part of a disturbing pattern of lethal strikes in populated areas by Israel, and of total disregard for the ceasefire," calling them "war crimes and a violation of the UN Charter."
Lebanon filed a formal complaint with the UN Security Council in January, documenting 2,036 Israeli violations of its sovereignty across the final three months of 2025 alone, a figure that included repeated fire directed at UNIFIL personnel.
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