On September 28, 2024, in the southern suburbs of Beirut, residents inspected the damage after Israeli bombing overnight.
Anwar Amro | AFP | Getty Images
Israel launched airstrikes on Beirut’s southern suburbs and other parts of Lebanon on Saturday, a day after they carried out a massive attack on Hezbollah headquarters in what appeared to be an attempt to kill Hezbollah leader Said Hassan Nasrul pull.
The fate of Nasrallah, who has been leader of the Iran-backed group for 32 years, remains unclear and Hezbollah has not issued any statement on his identity.
Reuters reporters heard of more than 20 airstrikes in Beirut before dawn on Saturday, and more after sunrise. Smoke could be seen rising over Dahiya, a Hezbollah-controlled southern suburb of the city.
Thousands of people have fled the area since Friday’s attack, gathering in squares, parks and sidewalks in downtown Beirut and on the waterfront.
“They want to destroy Dahiye, they want to destroy us all,” said Sari, a man in his 30s who gave only his first name. suburbs. Nearby, recently displaced people rolled their mats onto the ground and tried to sleep in Beirut’s Martyrs Square.
The Israeli military said a missile fired into central Israel on Saturday hit an open area. Earlier, the military said about 10 artillery shells crossed from Lebanon into Israel, some of which had been intercepted.
The Israeli military also said it was attacking Hezbollah targets in the Bekaa Valley, an area of eastern Lebanon on the border with Syria, where it carried out attacks last week.
Friday’s attack follows a five-hour barrage of Israeli attacks on Beirut early Saturday, the most powerful attack on the city so far during Israel’s conflict with Hezbollah, which also clashes with Gaza. The war raged on simultaneously for nearly a year.
The escalation has sharply heightened concerns that the conflict could spiral out of control and could involve Iran, Hezbollah’s main backer, as well as the United States.
There was no immediate confirmation of Nasrallah’s fate after Friday’s violent attack, but a source close to Hezbollah told Reuters he could not be reached.
Israel has not said whether it attempted to attack Nasrallah, but senior Israeli officials said senior Hezbollah commanders had been targeted.
Asked whether Friday’s attack killed Nasrallah, the Israeli official told reporters: “I think it’s too early to say… Sometimes they hide the truth when we succeed.”
Earlier, a source close to Hezbollah told Reuters that Nasrallah was still alive.
Iran’s Tasnim news agency also reported that he was safe. A senior Iranian security official told Reuters that Tehran was checking his identity.
The Israeli military said in a statement that it had killed Hezbollah missile unit commander Mohammed Ali Ismail and his deputy Hussein Ahmed Ismail.
This week, Israel’s attack on Lebanon expanded to new areas. The Lebanese mountain town of Bhamdoun, southeast of Beirut, was hit by airstrikes on Saturday, regional lawmaker Mark Daou told Reuters.
Walid Khayrallah, the mayor of Bamdu, told Reuters the attack hit a large open area and caused no casualties.
Death toll rises
Hours before the latest attack, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the United Nations that Israel had the right to continue the campaign.
“As long as Hezbollah chooses the path of war, Israel has no choice and has every right to eliminate this threat and allow our citizens to return home safely,” he said.
As Netanyahu approached the podium, several delegations exited. He later cut short his trip to New York and returned to Israel.
On September 28, 2024, thick smoke rose from the southern suburbs of Beirut after an Israeli night bombing.
Anwar Amro | AFP | Getty Images
Lebanese health authorities confirmed that six people were killed and 91 injured in Friday’s first attack, the fourth in a week in Beirut’s Hezbollah-controlled southern suburbs and the worst since the 2006 war.
The death toll appears likely to be higher. There was no word yet on casualties from the subsequent attack. Authorities say more than 700 people have been killed in strikes over the past week.
Hezbollah’s al-Manar television reported that seven buildings had been destroyed.
Hours later, the Israeli military asked residents in parts of Beirut’s southern suburbs to evacuate as it targeted missile launchers and weapons storage sites it said were under civilian homes.
Hezbollah’s media office said in a statement that the group denied finding any weapons or arsenal in the building that was attacked in a Beirut suburb.
Alaa al-Din Saeed, a resident of a neighborhood targeted by Israel, told Reuters he was fleeing with his wife and three children.
“We found out on TV. There was a huge riot nearby,” he said. The family took clothes, identification documents and some cash but were stuck in traffic with others trying to escape.
“We’re going to the mountains. We’ll see how we spend the night – we’ll see what we can do tomorrow.”
Some 100,000 people were displaced in Lebanon this week, bringing the number of people uprooted in the country to well over 200,000.
The Israeli government says returning some 70,000 Israeli evacuees home is a war goal.
Worried that the war will spread
Hezbollah has fired hundreds of rockets and missiles at Israeli targets, including Tel Aviv. The group said rockets were fired at the northern Israeli city of Safed on Friday, where a woman was treated for minor injuries.
Israel’s air defense systems have ensured that losses have been kept to a minimum so far.
On September 27, 2024, a rocket launched from southern Lebanon was intercepted by the Israeli Iron Dome air defense system in the Upper Galilee region of northern Israel.
Under Marey | AFP | Getty Images
Iran said Friday’s attack crossed a “red line” and accused Israel of using U.S.-made “bunker-busting” bombs.
At this week’s annual United Nations General Assembly, rising tensions have raised concerns among countries including France, which has proposed a 21-day ceasefire with the United States.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken told a news conference in New York: “We believe the path forward is through diplomacy, not conflict… We will continue to work intentionally with all parties to urge them to choose this path.”
Following the Palestinian militant group Hamas’s attack on Israel in Gaza on October 7 last year, Hezbollah immediately launched a missile attack on Israel, starting the latest battle in the decades-old conflict.
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