Israel-Lebanon latest: Intense strikes on Hezbollah launched by Israeli military as it warns civilians to flee
Threat of all-out regional war grows as Israel denies involvement in deadly pager attacks
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The Israeli military has told residents of southern Lebanon to immediately evacuate homes and other buildings where Hezbollah stores weapons as it says it is carrying out “extensive strikes” against the militant group.
It was the first warning of its kind in nearly a year of steadily escalating conflict and came after a particularly heavy exchange of fire on Sunday. Israel said it struck around 290 targets inside Lebanon after Hezbollah launched more than 100 rockets at northern Israel.
Residents in Hezbollah-controlled southern Lebanon have now been told to evacuate as Israeli airstrikes on the area are imminent.
Israeli Arabic-language military spokesperson Avichay Adraee posted a message on X, formerly Twitter, warning that another “raid will begin in the near future”.
“Evacuate the houses where [Hezbollah] weapons are hidden immediately! Hezbollah is lying to you and sacrificing you,” he wrote.
“Hezbollah says that you are its environment and that you are its audience, but it seems that its missiles and drones are more valuable and important to it than you.”
Hezbollah declares ‘open-ended battle of reckoning’ with Israel and fires more than 100 rockets
Hezbollah launched more than 100 rockets across northern Israel on Sunday as a senior leader declared an “open-ended battle of reckoning”, with both sides appearing closer than ever to all-out war.
Some of the rockets landed near the city of Haifa; one struck near a residential building in Kiryat Bialik, wounding at least three people and setting buildings and cars on fire.
It followed Israeli strikes on Lebanon that have killed dozens, including a veteran Hezbollah commander, and an unprecedented attack targeting the group’s communications devices.
Report:
Hezbollah declares ‘open-ended battle of reckoning’ with Israel
Air raid sirens across northern Israel sent hundreds of thousands of people scrambling into shelters
Israel denies involvement with pager attack
Israel has denied having any involvement with a deadly exploding pager attack which injured thousands of people across Lebanon and Syria.
Israeli president Isaac Herzog said he “rejects out of hand any connection” to the audacious operation carried out against Hezbollah on Tuesday.
At least 39 people were injured and 3,000 were wounded after the Shi’ite militia’s pagers and walkie-talkies simultaneously detonated across the Middle East.
Hezbollah says it's using new weapons
Hezbollah said it had launched dozens of Fadi 1 and Fadi 2 missiles — a new weapon the group hadn’t used before — at the Ramat David airbase, southeast of Haifa, “in response to the repeated Israeli attacks that targeted various Lebanese regions and led to the fall of many civilian martyrs”.
In July, the group released what it said was video it had taken of the base with surveillance drones.
Hezbollah also said it had targeted facilities of the Rafael defence firm, headquartered in Haifa, calling it retaliation for the wireless devices attack. It didn’t provide evidence, and the Israeli military declined to comment.
Hezbollah vowed to retaliate for a wave of explosions that hit pagers and walkie-talkies belonging to Hezbollah members on Tuesday and Wednesday, killing at least 37 people — including two children — and wounding about 3,000. The attacks were widely blamed on Israel, which hasn’t confirmed or denied responsibility.
An Israeli airstrike on Friday took down an eight-story building in a densely populated Beirut suburb as Hezbollah members met in the basement, according to Israel. Among those killed was Ibrahim Akil, who commanded the group’s special forces unit.
UN envoy says the region is on the brink of catastrophe
The Middle East is on the edge of disaster, warns Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert, the UN envoy for Lebanon. The region has seen a significant escalation of hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah, with the conflict in Gaza nearing its one-year mark.
Israel and Hezbollah have been exchanging fire since Hamas initiated the conflict with a 7 October attack on Israel last year, resulting in approximately 1,200 deaths and 250 hostages taken. Over 41,000 Palestinians have since been killed, with women and children accounting for more than half of the casualties, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip.
With the region on the brink of an imminent catastrophe, it cannot be overstated enough: there is NO military solution that will make either side safer.
Families of Israeli hostages and residents of Gaza expressed fears the fighting in Lebanon will divert international attention from their own plights.
“I’m incredibly concerned with the increased tensions with Hezbollah because, my biggest concern is that, all the public’s attention and the world’s attention” would be distracted, said Udi Goren, a relative of Tal Haimi, an Israeli who was killed 7 October and whose body was taken into Gaza.
Enas Kollab, a Palestinian displaced from Gaza, voiced similar fears. “We are afraid that the situation in Lebanon will affect us - that all attention will turn to Lebanon and we will become forgotten,” she said.
Hezbollah responds to unprecedented blows
The rocket attacks followed an Israeli airstrike Friday in Beirut that killed at least 45 people, including Ibrahim Akil, one of Hezbollah’s top leaders, several other fighters, and women and children.
Hezbollah was already reeling from a sophisticated attack that caused thousands of pagers and walkie-talkies to explode just days earlier. But it faces a difficult balance of stretching the rules of engagement by hitting deeper into Israel, while at the same time trying to avoid large-scale attacks on civilian areas and infrastructure that could trigger a full-scale war that it would rather not start and take the blame for.
Hezbollah’s deputy leader Naim Kassem said Sunday’s rocket attack was just the beginning of what’s now an “open-ended battle” with Israel.
“We admit that we are pained. We are humans. But as we are pained — you will also be pained,” Kassem said at Akil’s funeral.
He vowed Hezbollah will continue military operations against Israel in support of Gaza but also warned of unexpected attacks “from outside the box,” pointing to rockets fired deeper into Israel.
Hezbollah hits back with rockets as it declares an 'open-ended battle' with Israel
Hezbollah fired over 100 rockets early on Sunday across northern Israel, with some landing near the city of Haifa, as Israel launched hundreds of strikes on Lebanon.
A Hezbollah leader declared an “open-ended battle” was underway as both sides appeared to be spiraling closer toward all-out war.
The overnight rocket barrage was in response to Israeli attacks in Lebanon that have killed dozens, including a veteran Hezbollah commander, and an unprecedented attack targeting the group’s communications devices. Air raid sirens across northern Israel sent hundreds of thousands of people scrambling into shelters.
One struck near a residential building in Kiryat Bialik, a city near Haifa, wounding at least three people and setting buildings and cars ablaze. Israel’s Magen David Adom rescue service said four people were wounded.
Avi Vazana raced to a shelter with his wife and nine-month-old baby before he heard the rocket hitting. Then he went back outside to see if anyone was hurt.
“I ran without shoes, without a shirt, only with pants. I ran to this house when everything was still on fire to try to find if there are other people,” he said.
Lebanon’s health ministry said three people were killed and four wounded in Israeli strikes near the border, without saying whether they were civilians or combatants.
In focus: How the plot to explode Hezbollah’s pagers and walkie-talkies unfolded
How the plot to explode Hezbollah’s pagers and walkie-talkies unfolded
Israel’s Mossad spy agency is believed to be behind the operation, Chris Stevenson writes, which likely took months of planning
Comment: The Hezbollah pager attacks prove that Israel has no strategy for peace
The Hezbollah pager attacks prove that Israel has no strategy for peace
With the first anniversary of 7 October approaching, Israel is no closer to a resolution of the Gaza conflict – and making terrorists’ electronic devices explode will not help, says Bronwen Maddox
What to know about the growing conflict between Israel and Lebanon's Hezbollah
What to know about the growing conflict between Israel and Lebanon's Hezbollah
This week saw a dizzying escalation in the 11-month-old conflict between Israel and Lebanon’s Hezbollah
Israel will do 'everything necessary' to return evacuated residents to their homes
Israel’s defence minister Yoav Gallant has said that strikes on Lebanon will continue until it is safe for evacuated people in the north of Israel to return to their homes.
“Hezbollah has begun to feel some of the capabilities of the Israel Defence Forces, and there is already a very strong feeling of being persecuted, and we are seeing the results,” he said during a tour of Israeli Air Force facilities.
“These moves will continue until we reach a situation where we safely return the residents of the north to their homes - this is the goal, this is the mission, and we will do everything necessary to meet it,” he added.
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