Beirut:
The Israeli army said Thursday it had struck Hezbollah’s intelligence headquarters in the Lebanese capital, as troops battled militants near the border and warplanes bombed their strongholds across the country.
Israel announced this week that its forces had begun “ground attacks” in parts of southern Lebanon, a Hezbollah stronghold, after days of heavy bombardment of areas across the country where the group holds sway.
The Lebanese Health Ministry said the bombing killed more than a thousand people and forced hundreds of thousands to flee their homes in a country already mired in an economic and political crisis.
Israel, which has been at war in Gaza since Hamas attacked on October 7, says it has shifted its focus to securing its northern border and ensuring the safe return of more than 60,000 people killed by Hezbollah attacks over the past year are displaced.
On the Gaza front, the Israeli army said an attack three months ago killed three senior Hamas leaders, including Rahwi Mushtaha, the head of the militant movement’s government in the war-torn Palestinian territory.
In Lebanon, the Israeli army said it had “hit targets of Hezbollah’s intelligence headquarters in Beirut.”
Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency reported three airstrikes on Beirut’s southern suburbs, with a source close to Hezbollah telling AFP that the target was an evacuated building housing the group’s media relations office.
Israel has ordered the Lebanese people to evacuate more than 20 villages and the city of Nabatiyeh.
“For your own safety, you should immediately evacuate your homes and move north of the Awali River. Save your lives,” army spokesman Avichay Adraee said on X.
Strike in central Beirut
Hezbollah said it rebuffed an attempt by Israeli forces to advance to the Fatima Gate on the border.
It also said it fired two explosives against advancing Israeli forces as it continued its cross-border rocket fire.
The army said an overnight attack killed 15 Hezbollah fighters in Bint Jbeil, an area badly damaged during Israel’s last war with the militant group in 2006.
Later, the Lebanese army said one of its soldiers was killed when “the Israeli enemy attacked an army post in the Bint Jbeil area” – the third death among its troops in the current escalation – prompting retaliatory fire.
A Lebanese military official said this was the army’s first response to Israeli fire since last October.
Israel earlier carried out a deadly airstrike in central Beirut, hitting a rescue facility run by Hezbollah’s emergency services, killing seven workers, the agency said.
Hassan Ammar, 82, who stayed in the high-rise building whose walls were partially blown away by the attack after fleeing southern Lebanon, said: “We are peaceful citizens in our homes.”
Israel has not yet commented on the attack, but said it had hit about 200 Hezbollah targets “on Lebanese territory.”
More than 40 rescue workers and firefighters have been killed by Israeli fire in three days, according to Lebanese Health Minister Firass Abiad.
Iranian missile attack
The latest attacks came after Hezbollah backer Iran launched its second direct missile attack on Israel, prompting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to warn that Tehran would pay.
As Israel considers retaliation for the Iranian missile attack, President Joe Biden said the United States “fully supported” the ally but did not support an attack on Iran’s nuclear sites.
Iran, which arms and finances Lebanese Hezbollah, said it would intensify its response if Israel counterattacked.
Israel’s ground operations and attacks follow the killing of Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah and other commanders in a massive bombing in southern Beirut.
Israel intercepted most of the 200 missiles launched by Iran. A Palestinian was killed by shrapnel in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant warned that “those who attack the State of Israel will pay a high price”, while Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian warned of a “stronger” response.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said the rockets were fired in retaliation for the killing of Nasrallah alongside that of a general of the Guard’s Quds Force, and for the July killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran.
A day after the army said it would launch ground operations in southern Lebanon, Israel on Wednesday reported the first death of a soldier in the war between Israel and Hezbollah, a toll that later rose to eight deaths.
The Israeli army said it had deployed a second division to support the fighting.
The Lebanese Health Ministry said 46 people were killed and 85 others injured by Israeli strikes in the past 24 hours.
‘Sickening cycle’
The impact of the war was also felt in Syria, where an Israeli attack in Damascus killed four people, including Hassan Jaafar al-Qasir, Nasrallah’s son-in-law, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
According to Iranian media, a military ‘adviser’ to the Revolutionary Guards in Syria, Majid Divani, succumbed on Thursday to injuries sustained during an Israeli attack on Damascus earlier this week.
In Israel’s commercial hub Tel Aviv, Liron Yori, 22, said he was worried about “where the war is going and I don’t feel comfortable with it.”
The fighting comes as many Israelis celebrate Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, on Thursday.
UN chief Antonio Guterres called for an end to the “sickening cycle of escalation” in the Middle East and the G7 group of wealthy countries said a diplomatic solution was “still possible”.
Months of similar calls and mediation efforts have so far failed to lead to a ceasefire in Gaza.
Hezbollah began attacks on Israeli forces a day after Hamas carried out its attack on Israel on October 7, resulting in the deaths of 1,205 people in Israel, mostly civilians, according to an AFP count based on Israeli official figures, including hostages held in captivity have died.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive in Gaza has killed at least 41,788 people, the majority of them civilians, according to Health Ministry figures in the Hamas-held territory. The UN has described the figures as reliable.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)