Air strikes kill two in Lebanon’s north-east
Israeli air strikes on Lebanon’s north-eastern Baalbek-Hermel province killed two people in 24 hours as border clashes with Iran-backed Hezbollah continue to reach further into the country.
Strikes in the area on Monday evening killed one person and left several injured.
Hezbollah responded by firing more than 100 rockets at Israeli military bases yesterday, which was followed by further Israeli strikes that killed a second person in north-eastern Lebanon.
Baalbek Mayor Fuad Balouk told The National that both of those killed were civilians, and called the strikes “a message of Israel widening the conflict in an effort to pressure Hezbollah, and citizens, and the resistance in general”.
But, he added, although the raids hit deep inside Lebanon, they remained under the established but unspoken rules of engagement between Israel and Hezbollah.
“The problem is those boundaries keep expanding,” he said.
The province was first bombed two weeks ago, in Israel’s deepest attack into Lebanon since the 2006 war.
The Israeli military said yesterday’s strikes “struck two Hezbollah military command centres” in response to the Lebanese group’s barrage.
“Hezbollah used these sites to store significant assets used to strengthen its weapons arsenal,” it said. Hezbollah said its rocket attack on Israel’s Upper Galilee region were conducted “in response to the Israeli attacks on our people, villages and cities – most recently in the vicinity of the city of Baalbek”.
Shortly after Hezbollah announced its attack, Israel bombed a main road leading into Baalbek, a Hezbollah official said.
The strike was “an insistence on the part of the enemy to expand its aggression against Lebanon”, said MP Melhem Hujeiri, a native of the province, which is considered a Hezbollah stronghold.
Earlier on Monday, Hezbollah had launched a cross-border drone attack on an Israeli air defence outpost in the occupied Golan Heights, which the militia said was carried out with “accuracy”.
Hezbollah and the Israeli military have been exchanging fire across the border since October 8, when the militia declared support for its ally Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
The clashes have mostly been contained to the border area, although Israel has struck deeper into Lebanon in recent weeks.
Tens of thousands of people on both sides of the border have been displaced by the fighting.
Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah has said the group will not agree to a ceasefire until one is achieved in Gaza.
Israel has said it intends to push the militia back from the border “by diplomacy or by force”.