Israel strikes parts of Lebanon as Hezbollah launches rockets at airport near Haifa

I increasing fighting The standoff between Israel and Hezbollah continued on Saturday as the two sides traded strikes as the war in Gaza approaches one year.

The Israel Defense Forces said its army struck Hezbollah fighters inside a mosque in southern Lebanon they said was used as a coordination center “to plan and carry out terrorist attacks against IDF forces and the State of Israel.”

The mosque was located near the Salah Ghandour hospital in the city of Bint Jbeil. The hospital said in a statement that Israeli soldiers fired the bombs after being warned to evacuate. The shooting “resulted in nine members of the medical and nursing staff being injured, most of them seriously,” and most of the medical staff were evacuated. On Thursday, the World Health Organization said 28 health workers in Lebanon had been killed in the past 24 hours.

At the same time, 12 Israeli airstrikes hit areas south of Beirut, including those that badly damaged the main hall where Hezbollah used to hold events, Lebanese state media said.

Over the course of the day, more strikes hit the area, where tens of thousands of people have fled in the past two weeks.

Israeli warplanes also struck southern and eastern Lebanon, according to state media. About six people died, according to NNA.

Meanwhile, Hezbollah said it launched a series of rockets at an Israeli airbase near Haifa, which is about 30 kilometers from the Lebanese border. Israeli police said pieces of interceptors fell in several places but no injuries were reported, according to the Associated Press.

On Saturday evening, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that the Israeli army succeeded in destroying Hezbollah’s weapons and turned the war against the group supported by Iran.

“We have destroyed a large part of the artillery and rockets that Hezbollah has built over the years,” Netanyahu said in a televised address, adding: “We have changed the way of war and the balance of war.”

Israel has sharply increased its strikes on Lebanon in recent weeks after a year of heavy lifting. Iran-backed Hezbollah – has long been designated a terrorist organization by the US, Israel and many other nations. The IDF has been shelling the heavily populated areas of south Beirut, a Hezbollah stronghold, at night. During the night, the military spokesman issued three warnings for residents to evacuate.

Almost a week of Israeli operations on the ground in southern Lebanon, near Israel’s northern border, and two weeks of airstrikes in that region and south of Beirut – both Hezbollah strongholds – it had killed more than 2,000 peoplesaid the health department. More than a million people have been driven from their homes, including tens of thousands under Israeli evacuation orders from nearly 100 towns and villages near the border.

Hezbollah launched the attack in support of its ally Hamas, which is also backed by Iran, the day after Hamas launched the attack. war in Gaza for its terrorist attacks on October 7, 2023 in Israel. The IDF says Hezbollah terrorists have fired more than 10,000 rockets along the border since Oct. 8.

Netanyahu on Saturday also criticized French President Emmanuel Macron for asking to stop the transfer of weapons to Israel.

“Since Israel is fighting the barbarian forces led by Iran, all civilized countries must stand firmly on Israel’s side. However, President Macron and other Western leaders are now demanding that weapons be banned from Israel. It should be a shame,” Netanyahu said in a statement. issued by his office.

Earlier this week, Macron called on Israel to immediately end its military operations in Lebanon because “many civilians have become victims.”

Israel made more ground attacks, attacking northern Lebanon

I Israeli soldiers said on Saturday its special forces attacked Hezbollah’s infrastructure in southern Lebanon, destroying missiles, launchers, towers and weapons storage facilities. The army said that the soldiers also dismantled the trenches used by Hezbollah when it approached the Israeli border.

About 1.2 million people have been driven from their homes since Israel stepped up its strikes in late September aimed at crippling Hezbollah and removing it from the countries’ shared border. On Tuesday, Israel launched what it called a limited operation to enter southern Lebanon.

In the past few days, nine Israeli soldiers have died in the battles that took place in this area, full of weapons and explosives, the army said.

Elsewhere, the IDF attacked a Palestinian refugee camp deep in Lebanon for the first time.

An attack on the Beddawi camp near the northern city of Tripoli killed a Hamas military officer and his wife and two young daughters, the Palestinian terrorist group said in a statement. Hamas later said another member of its army was killed in an Israeli strike in the eastern Bekaa Valley.

The Israeli military said it had killed two senior officers of the Hamas military wing in Lebanon, one near Tripoli.

Americans are trying to leave Lebanon

The US government has warned Americans not to travel to Lebanon since mid-September and urged any citizens in the country to travel on commercial travel routes. As of Saturday evening, the US State Department helped about 600 US citizens, permanent residents and their families to leave Lebanon on flights organized by the agency.

Other countries are also working to evacuate their citizens from Lebanon. Germany evacuated 460 civilians on German military planes, and a Dutch military transport plane carried more than 100 civilians out of Lebanon. There were also citizens of Belgium, Finland and Ireland who were sent back to the plane.

“It is good that these people have returned safely to the Netherlands. These have been difficult times for them,” said Christiaan Rebergen, secretary general of the foreign ministry, after arriving on Friday.

Fighting continues in Gaza

Palestinian medical officials say Israeli strikes in northern and central Gaza on Saturday killed at least nine people, including two children.

Another strike hit a group of people in the northern city of Beit Hanoun, killing at least five people, including two children, according to the Ambulance and Emergency Service of the Ministry of Health.

Another strike hit a house north of the Nuseirat refugee camp, killing at least four people, Awda Hospital said. The strike also left a number of people injured, it said.

The Israeli military did not comment on the strike but has long accused Hamas of operating in the occupied territories.

Earlier, the Israeli military warned residents in the central parts of Gaza to evacuate, saying that its troops would soon operate there in response to Palestinian threats.

The warnings include areas along the strategic corridor in central Gaza, which was at the heart of the obstacles to the ceasefire agreement earlier this summer. The army warned the Palestinians in the refugee camps of Nuseirat and Bureij, which are near the Netzarim tunnel, to go out to the Gaza coast called Muwasi, where the army has designated a humanitarian aid station. It is unclear how many Palestinians currently live in the areas affected by the order, parts of which were previously evacuated.

About 42,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza during the nearly year-long war, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health, which does not distinguish between civilian and military deaths.