BEIRUT, Aug. 17 -- United Nations peacekeepers watched Israeli naval vessels operate inside Lebanon's territorial waters and wrote it down. They have four and a half months left to write anything down at all.

UNIFIL observed several Israeli military maritime activities in Lebanese territorial waters, the UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric told reporters on Monday, adding that the vessels afterwards withdrew into Israel's own waters. He gave no count, no dates and no description of the ships.

The force recording those movements is being dismantled on a fixed timetable. On August 28 last year the Security Council unanimously adopted Resolution 2790, extending UNIFIL's mandate to December 31, 2026, and describing that extension as the final on...