Israel struck a Beirut suburb and expanded attacks across southern Lebanon, where Lebanese authorities reported at least 14 deaths and dozens wounded.
Israel's air force struck a southern suburb of Beirut on Thursday, its military said, as Israeli attacks across southern Lebanon killed at least 14 people and prompted sweeping evacuation warnings in one of the sharpest escalations since a ceasefire took effect last month.
The Beirut strike hit Choueifat, an area near the capital's international airport. The target was not immediately clear. Videos from the area showed white smoke rising from a residential neighbourhood, and the Israeli military described the attack as targeted while saying further details would follow.
Casualty figures were still moving. CBC, citing the Lebanese Health Ministry and the state-run National News Agency, reported at least 14 people killed across southern Lebanon and dozens wounded. Al Jazeera, citing Lebanese health authorities, put the toll at at least 16 killed and 58 wounded, while the BBC cited a ministry toll of at least 11 killed in the latest strikes.
Among the dead were five people killed when an Israeli drone struck an apartment building in Sidon where displaced families were living, according to CBC. Twenty-one others were wounded there, including five children. In Adloun, on the coastal route between Sidon and Tyre, a drone strike hit a car carrying a family that was fleeing, killing six people, including two children and their parents, the Lebanese Health Ministry said. Two more people were killed on a motorcycle near Tyre, and the Lebanese military said one of its soldiers was killed by an Israeli drone strike near Nabatiyeh.
The strikes followed Israeli evacuation warnings for buildings and neighbourhoods in Tyre, Lebanon's fourth-largest city, and broader orders for residents in parts of the south to move north of the Zahrani River, about 40 kilometres from the Israeli border. The BBC reported that the Israeli military has ordered residents to leave areas amounting to roughly 17 per cent of Lebanon's territory. Ambulance crews in Tyre were driving through neighbourhoods urging residents to leave, and shelters in Sidon were already full, the head of the municipality told the BBC.
Israel said its strikes were aimed at Hezbollah infrastructure. The escalation came after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced an expansion of Israeli military operations in Lebanon following Hezbollah drone attacks on Israeli troops and northern Israeli communities. The Israeli military said one Israeli soldier was killed and two reservists were wounded in a Hezbollah drone attack in northern Israel.
Hezbollah said Thursday it had launched several attacks on Israeli troops and tanks that had crossed the Litani River into Zawtar al-Sharqieh near Nabatiyeh, where close-range fighting was continuing. The group has claimed dozens of drone and rocket attacks targeting Israeli forces in southern Lebanon and northern Israel.
The fighting has placed new strain on a nominal ceasefire that took effect April 17 but has not stopped attacks. Israeli and Lebanese officials have accused each other of violating the arrangement. The International Committee of the Red Cross warned that conditions for civilians in southern Lebanon were worsening, with the head of its delegation in Lebanon, Agnes Dhur, saying the situation was "nearing a perilous tipping point."
More than one million people in Lebanon have been displaced by the war between Israel and Hezbollah, according to CBC. The Lebanese Health Ministry says at least 3,269 people have been killed in Israeli strikes since the start of the war, with more than 9,800 wounded.
The latest escalation comes as U.S.-mediated diplomatic efforts are expected to resume this week. The immediate questions are whether the Beirut target will be identified, whether casualty figures rise and whether the expanding strikes further undermine efforts to keep the ceasefire from collapsing completely.
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