I'm still alive but I've lost four team mates, says NZ survivor

Andrew Greig with his wife Bronwyn Wood and son Josiah, 6, in Galilee in May.

Only "sheer luck" saved New Zealander Andrew Greig from being at the United Nations base in Lebanon where an Israeli air strike killed four of his fellow peacekeepers.

Squadron Leader Greig was meant to be at the post, but fighting between Israel and Hizbollah stopped him from getting there.

That was "sheer luck", he wrote in an email to his family. "I could not travel because of heavy shelling in the area of operation."

"I'm still alive but I've lost four team mates out of a team of 10."

It is the second lucky escape for Squadron Leader Greig.

A bomb blast shattered windows of his apartment in Tyre 11 days ago.

The window was broken by pieces of concrete from a neighbouring building that was hit.

The force of the blast left concrete shards embedded in the wall of a bedroom used by Squadron Leader Greig's two young sons, who were watching a DVD in the living room at the time.

Squadron Leader Greig's wife Bronwyn Wood and the boys were evacuated to Cyprus last week.

They were to travel to England yesterday, and his mother-in-law Beulah Wood, who lives in Auckland, did not know if her daughter knew about the attack on the UN base.

"It's getting to a stage where one feels this is absolutely insufferable and unacceptable," Mrs Wood said.

The UN observers killed in the strike were from Austria, Canada, China and Finland, and were at a long-established post at Khiam.

Israel apologised for the bombing, and said it would investigate how it happened.

But UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan has suggested the post might have been deliberately targeted.

Israel's Prime Minister Ehud Olmert expressed "deep regret"over the airstrike, saying the UN post was hit by mistake.

He expressed dismay over Mr Annan's comments.

"It's inconceivable for the UN to define an error as an apparently deliberate action."

In Parliament, Prime Minister Helen Clark condemned the attack, saying it was "very, very shocking".

"The UN is there for one purpose only and that is to try and contribute to peace, and we know that one of our people, sent there in good faith by us, was by sheer luck not at that base at that time."

Squadron Leader Greig is one of two New Zealand Defence Force staff in Lebanon.

They are under UN command, and a Defence Force spokesman said any decisions on whether they would be evacuated would be made by the UN.

Another New Zealander is working for the UN in Lebanon on de-mining.

Helen Clark took the unusual step of making a statement about the incident to Parliament.

She said she was deeply shocked by the fatalities, and noted other UN personnel had been injured in attacks by the Israeli army and the Hizbollah forces they are attacking.

"New Zealand has consistently and strongly urged all sides to pull back from violence, observe international law, and allow international facilitators and mediators a chance to put a peace process together," she said.

"We reiterate that call today.

"Just as Hizbollah is urged to stop its attacks, so must Israel cease the disproportionate violence which is striking civilians, infrastructure and UN personnel and posts.

"There should be an immediate ceasefire, but, in the absence of this, we call on both sides to cease attacks in the vicinity of civilians and UN posts and personnel."

Helen Clark said New Zealand would be conveying its concerns about the attack to Israel through New Zealand's permanent representative to the UN, the New Zealand High Commissioner in Australia, and New Zealand's Ambassador to Israel, who is based in Turkey.

Israel's Ambassador to New Zealand, Naftali Tamir, is in Canberra. He could not be contacted yesterday.

All other parties joined the Prime Minister in condemning the attack, although Act leader Rodney Hide took exception to Helen Clark's call for Israel to cease the disproportionate violence.

"I ask New Zealanders, and this Parliament, to consider what would be New Zealand's response if we had to confront a neighbour right on our borders who had committed such atrocities, and whether we would stand idly by and talk about a proportionate response," Mr Hide said.

National leader Don Brash said his party deeply regretted the loss of innocent lives on both sides of the Israeli-Lebanese border.

Green foreign affairs spokesman, Keith Locke, said it was clear both Israel and Hizbollah were committing war crimes.