By Samer Haj Ali

South Lebanon - One of “Israel’s” true faces surfaced along Lebanon’s coastal waters. Its features were made up of solid waste that came very close to the shoreline of southern Lebanon. Al-Ahed learned that some of the waste made its way just a few hundred meters off the beach of Al-Saksikiyeh, south of Sidon. It may not be a coincidence that the waste was found in this particular area, which has been the site of several “Israeli” attacks. A group of elite “Israeli” naval commandos met their end on the outskirts of Ansariya after an unsuccessful attempt to carry out an incursion in September 1997.

The waste may be the latest message of aggression from “Israel” via the sea. Today, it is targeting one of the more serene coastal areas. Along the coastline between Saksakiyeh south of Sidon and Qassimiyah north of Tyre, foodstuff nylon and canvas bags flooded the water. Some of the food was consumed in the Zionist entity, while others dissolved in the water. Either way, “Israel” is sending its garbage to Lebanon’s waters. At the same time, it is trying to steal the country’s natural resources. It is attempting to put its hands on the vast oil blocs along the border. Therefore, it is not a coincidence that “Israel” is throwing garbage in the same place that it is trying to steal oil from. It is a double aggression that is targeting the sovereignty, rights and natural resources of the land of the cedars.

The head of the Lebanese Diving Center, Youssef El-Gendy, exposed the suspicious “Israeli” act. El-Gendy told Al-Ahed news website that he and a group of divers were on a regular diving and fishing trip when they stumbled upon piles of garbage floating on the surface of the water. Scenes like this were repeated at other sites. A twenty-meter-long container made from nylon and cloth and tied with ropes was also spotted. Garbage and plastic bags were coming out of the container. Hebrew inscriptions on these bags pointed to the origin of the waste, “Israel”.

El-Gendy points out that along the occupied Palestinian coastline, there are no random landfills or waste mountains as we have in Lebanon. The Zionist entity recycles and sorts out its garbage. Meanwhile, the waste that has reached our territorial waters was not sorted nor treated. Meanwhile, wind direction, which controls water currents, rules out the possibility that the shipment of waste was moved by accident from a beach in “Israel”. Instead, it supports the hypothesis that it was intentionally thrown into sea in very large quantities.

“Many fishermen contacted us during the weekend to report seeing garbage and nylon bags with Hebrew inscriptions in Lebanese waters,” the diver adds.

El-Gendy believes that the “Israeli” enemy has actually tried to outsmart us by taking advantage of the weather forecast predicting that Lebanon will be hit by a storm. “Israel” thought that the waves and the wind will carry the waste towards the Lebanese shores without anyone noticing that it is actually an organized and well-thought out operation. But the latest violation of Lebanese sovereignty was exposed after the winds came in sooner than expected and carried the waste north before the arrival of the storm. El-Gendy called on officials in the concerned Lebanese ministries to take action.

For his part, diver Ayman Fakih, who was part of the diving team that discovered the Zionist violation, pointed out that he and his colleagues were able to extract a sample from the waste and hand it over to the authorities. Fakih confirms the waste originated from “Israel” and was carried north towards Lebanon by water currents. 

Fakih, who holds a law degree, believes that the recent incident is an “Israeli” attack on the sovereignty of our country and part of an ongoing aggression. It is related to the ongoing conflict with the Zionist entity, especially with regard to protecting our oil rights in the blocks adjacent to the occupied Palestinian borders. And this violation took place in one of those blocks.

This recent “Israeli” aggression comes weeks after Zionist soldiers set fire to olive groves and oak trees in the border town of al-Thahaira. The act of aggression was condemned by Engineer Hassan Hamza, a specialist in marine and aquatic life. Hamza stressed to Al-Ahed that the “Israeli” actions threaten environmental diversity and mainly marine life, especially the animals living in the sea, such as sea turtles, fish and others. It threatens the embryos and cells of these creatures because the decomposition of these wastes harms its safety and health and affects the offspring they are meant to produce.

Hamza notes that the waste also hurts creatures that might mistakenly eat them and harm the marine habitats or the places where they nest and reproduce as well as the feeding ground of fish.

Even though the “Israeli” entity boasts about being civilized, it throws its garbage directly into the sea. It has no regard for the environment. It is not possible to separate any geographical area from another. This means that any threat to Lebanon’s marine life will affect all adjacent areas.

This is the story of yet another “Israeli” aggression. This time, though, those who are entrusted with the task of implementing international decisions were completely absent from looking into these continuous violations. On one hand, turning a blind eye to the enemy's actions allows “Israel” to throw whatever it wants into our waters. On the other, “Israel” itself remains the prisoner of retaliatory action from the resistance that is ever-present.