Hezbollah fire missile barrage at Israeli base
14 troops hurt in new attack Hezbollah militants in southern Lebanon launched a barrage of guided missiles and armed drones on Wednesday targeting a military base in northern Israel.
Fourteen Israeli soldiers were injured in the strike on what Hezbollah said was a “new military reconnaissance command center” in Arab Al-Aramshe,” an Arab-majority village near the Lebanese border. They were treated at Galilee Medical Center in Nahariya, where the condition of six of those injured was described as serious. An Israeli army helicopter was also hit while rescuing the injured.
Israeli forces launched immediate retaliation by firing phosphorus bombs into the border area, including the outskirts of Rachaya Al-Fekhar, Fardis, Al-Habbariyeh, Alma Al-Shaab, Dhahira, Marwahin, and Yarin. The bombing destroyed a family home in the city of Nabatieh.
Israel and Hezbollah, an Iranbacked ally of Hamas, have been exchanging near-daily crossborder fire since the militant group in Gaza attacked Israel on Oct. 7. Wednesday’s incident was the third day in a row that Hezbollah strikes injured people in Israel, with regional tensions high after Iran launched a direct attack on Israel last weekend in retaliation for a deadly strike on Tehran’s consulate in Damascus on April 1.
Hezbollah said it launched Wednesday’s attack “in response to the enemy assassinating a number of resistance fighters in Ain
Baal and Shehabiya” on Tuesday. Israel said on Tuesday it had killed three Hezbollah fighters, including senior commander Ismail Youssef Baz, in drone strikes in southern Lebanon. Hussein Qasim Karsht, a leading figure in the Hezbollahallied Amal Movement, was also killed in the Israeli strikes. On Monday, Hezbollah targeted Israeli troops with explosive devices, injuring four soldiers who crossed into Lebanese territory, the first such attack in six months of clashes.
Security sources told Arab News that the Iran-backed militant group appeared to have adopted new tactics.
“These were seen last week, when they detonated explosive devices targeting Israeli soldiers on the border, injuring four Golani Brigade members.” Hezbollah had “taken the confrontations to another level by directly targeting Israeli soldiers,” the sources said.
The latest violence has killed at least 368 people in Lebanon, mostly Hezbollah fighters but also at least 70 civilians. In Israel, the military says 10 soldiers and eight civilians have been killed near the northern border since hostilities began.
Tens of thousands of civilians have fled their homes on both sides of the border, with the violence fueling fears of all-out conflict between Hezbollah and Israel.