BEIRUT (Dispatches) -- An Israeli drone struck a civilian vehicle being escorted by the Lebanese Armed Forces in southern Lebanon on Sunday, wounding five soldiers and at least two civilians despite a disgraceful U.S.-brokered framework agreement that was supposed to bring an end to Israeli atrocities. 
The attack occurred in the town of Kafra in the Bint Jbeil district when an Israeli drone dropped a grenade on the escorted vehicle, according to Lebanon’s National News Agency. 
The Lebanese Army confirmed its soldiers sustained injuries while accompanying civilians through the area—a mission that should have been routine under a “ceasefire” that has proven to be nothing more than a diplomatic farce.
The strike was no isolated incident. Israeli forces have intensified their brutal campaign across southern Lebanon, detonating civilian infrastructure with staggering violence. 
On Sunday alone, occupation forces fired Merkava tank shells and machine guns toward Haddatha, detonated a position in Taybeh, and carried out massive explosions in Kounine that echoed across the region. 
Days earlier, Israeli forces detonated approximately 700 tonnes of explosives near the UNESCO-listed Beaufort Castle, generating ground waves equivalent to a 3.8 magnitude earthquake.
Lebanese President Joseph Aoun condemned the Beaufort blasts as a “direct threat” to the framework agreement, calling them “an extremely dangerous escalation”. But words from Beirut have proven as hollow as the agreement itself.
The U.S.-brokered framework, signed in June and described by Secretary of State Marco Rubio as putting in place “lasting peace and security,” established so-called “pilot zones” where the Lebanese Army was to take exclusive control and Israeli forces were to withdraw. The Lebanese Army has begun deploying to areas like Zawtar al-Gharbieh, only to be shot at by Israeli forces the same day they arrived.
Hezbollah has rejected the deal outright, seeing it as a mechanism to solidify Israeli occupation under the guise of “stability”. The group’s fighters remain entrenched, confronting Israeli troops—an Egoz Unit officer was wounded by Hezbollah in overnight clashes over the weekend.  
The United States has no interest in Lebanon beyond pressuring the country to disarm its national resistance movement and wage war on Hezbollah.  
Over 4,300 Lebanese have been killed and more than a million displaced since March. The “framework agreement” has changed nothing except to provide diplomatic cover for continued Israeli aggression. 
The Lebanese Army, caught between an occupation that refuses to withdraw and a resistance it is pressured to disarm, finds itself taking fire from the very forces Washington claims are working for peace.