Hezbollah leaders were among those killed in an Israeli air strike near Beirut, the Israeli military said Saturday, as Lebanon raised the death toll from the attack to 37, including women and children.
Israel and Hezbollah continued to exchange gunfire on Saturday, a day after an airstrike claimed the lives of Ibrahim Akil, who commanded Hezbollah’s elite Radwan Force, and Ahmed Wahbi, another senior commander in the group’s military wing.
Firas Abiad told the media that the dead included seven women and three children. He said 68 others were injured, of which 15 are still in hospital, adding that the search and rescue work is still ongoing as the number of dead may increase.
The rare strike hit apartments in a residential area south of Beirut on Friday afternoon during rush hour. It was the deadliest strike against the Lebanese capital since Israel’s 2006 war with Hezbollah.
Hezbollah confirms that more than a dozen workers were killed
Akil, a top target, had been wanted by the US for years for his alleged role in the bombing of the US Embassy in Beirut in 1983 and the taking of American and German hostages in Lebanon in the 1980s. He was under US sanctions and the US State Department last year announced a reward of up to $7 million for information leading to his “identification, location, arrest and/or conviction.”
Wahbi was described as a commander who played a major role in Hezbollah for decades and was imprisoned in an Israeli prison in southern Lebanon in 1984. Hezbollah said he was one of the “area commanders” who ambushed in southern Lebanon in 1997 that left 12 Israeli soldiers dead. dead.
Hezbollah announced late Friday that 15 of its operatives had been killed by Israeli forces, but did not elaborate on where they went. Meanwhile, the spokesman for the Israeli army, Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani, said on Saturday 16 Hezbollah soldiers died in the strike.
Get the latest country news
For news that affects Canada and the world, sign up for breaking news alerts delivered directly to you as they happen.
Earlier, Israel said that Akil had been meeting with other soldiers in the basement of the house.
Rescuers dig through the rubble
Lebanese soldiers cordoned off the area around the collapsed building as members of the Lebanese Red Cross stood by to pick up any bodies found in the rubble. On Saturday morning, Hezbollah’s press office took journalists on a tour of the scene where workers were still digging through the ruins of the building.
Public Works and Transport Minister Ali Hamieh told reporters at the scene that 23 people are still missing.
An airstrike on the busy road of Qaim destroyed an eight-storey building containing 16 houses and damaged an adjacent one. The missiles destroyed the building and cut through the basement where Hezbollah officials were meeting, according to an Associated Press reporter who was at the scene.
The shops in the nearby building were badly damaged.
The Hezbollah attack preceded the Israeli airstrikes
Friday’s deadly strike came just hours after Hezbollah launched its first bombardment of northern Israel in more than a year, mostly targeting Israeli military positions. Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system has intercepted many Katyusha rockets.
The militant group said the latest wave of rocket salvos was a response to Israeli strikes in southern Lebanon. However, it came days after a massive explosion of Hezbollah pagers and walkie-talkies killed at least 37 people – including two children. Some 2,900 90 others were injured in the attack attributed to Israel.
Lebanon’s health minister said on Saturday hospitals across the country were full of wounded.
Israel neither confirmed nor denied involvement in the attack, which marked the biggest escalation in the past 11 months of conflict along the Israel-Lebanon border.
Israel, Hezbollah rocket attacks continue
On Saturday, Israel launched a wave of airstrikes in southern Lebanon, according to an Associated Press reporter in the area. Israel’s military said its military was attacking Hezbollah, without providing further details. The military group responded by firing dozens of rockets, local media reported.
It is not clear if there were any casualties in the recent strikes.
Earlier this week, Israel’s security cabinet said halting Hezbollah attacks in the country’s north to allow civilians to return to their homes is now an official war objective, as it considers a military operation in Lebanon that could destabilize the conflict. Israel has sent a powerful army to the northern border.
Hezbollah has maintained that it will only stop its strikes if a ceasefire agreement is reached in Gaza.
The tit-for-tat strikes have forced tens of thousands of people from their homes in both southern Lebanon and northern Israel.
Israel and Hezbollah have traded arms regularly since Hamas launched an October 7 attack on southern Israel and the Israeli military’s offensive on Gaza began. But previous cross-border attacks have mostly hit the depopulated areas of northern Israel and the sparsely populated areas of southern Lebanon.
© 2024 The Canadian Press
