Smoke rises from Beirut’s southern suburbs afterg Israeli airstrikes Tuesday morning. Photo by Wael Hamzah/EPA-EFE
At least two people were injured, one seriously, amid an uptick in Hezbollah rocket attacks on northern Israel overnight ahead of a meeting later Tuesday of the country’s security cabinet to approve a 60-day cease-fire with the Iran-backed group.
The two casualties came in Nahariya, where a 70-year-old woman and a man in his 80s sustained shrapnel injuries after a barrage of 10 rockets were launched at Israel’s most northerly coastal city and other settlements in the Western Galilee region. Advertisement
The Magen David Adom national emergency service said the woman’s condition was serious. Several other people were being treated for shock and anxiety.
Air raid sirens sounded along Israel’s northern border with Lebanon on Tuesday morning before a rocket struck a home in Kiryat Shmona, police and fire and rescue services said, but no one was reported hurt. Advertisement
Separately, the Israeli military reported one of its soldiers was seriously wounded in the Mount Hermon area on the Lebanon-Syria border in a drone strike. Israel Defense Forces said it was investigating the incident after a drone launched from Lebanon detonated near troops.
Israel responded with airstrikes on Beirut and Tyre in southern Lebanon.
The IDF issued evacuation orders for specific buildings, including two schools, in the Burj Al-Barajneh and pond enclosure districts of Beirut’s southern suburbs before hitting what it said were “Hezbollah facilities and interests.”
“You are located near Hezbollah facilities and interests, against which the IDF will operate in the near future. For your safety and the safety of your family members, you must evacuate these buildings and those adjacent to them immediately and stay away from them for a distance of no less than 500 meters,” the IDF warned in a post on X.
Footage circulating online showed palls of black smoke rising from areas of the capital.
The IDF also claimed its warplanes killed Hezbollah commander Ahmed Sobhi Hazima in a targeted attack on the Tyre area in the south.
Hazima was the group’s operations commander for the coastal sector, according to the Israeli military, having replaced a previous commander the IDF killed in a raid Nov. 17. Advertisement
“The so-called Hazima was supervising numerous terrorist plots, including plans to storm the border and launch anti-tank shells toward Israeli towns from the western sector before Operation Northern Arrows,” said IDF spokesman Avichay Adraee in a post on X.
“This elimination further impairs the Hezbollah terrorist organization’s ability to advance and carry out terrorist activities from southern Lebanon against Israeli civilians on the northern border.”
France and the European Union added their support to a draft cease-fire agreement negotiated by U.S. envoy Amos Hochstein for a 60-day transition period during which Israel withdraws its forces from south Lebanon, Hezbollah retreats north of the Litani River with its heavy weapons and the Lebanese Army, backed by the U.N. peacekeeping force, would fill a vacuum close to the border.
President Emmanuel Macron urged Israel and Hezbollah to “quickly seize this opportunity” presented by the negotiations which he said had “significantly advanced” as of late Monday.
U.S. National Security Council spokesman John Kirby expressed optimism, saying he believed “we’ve reached this point where we’re close,” but warned the effort might not get to the finish line.
Reports in Israeli and international media said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu agreed in principle to a U.S.-backed cease-fire with Hezbollah in Lebanon and was working out how to sell it to the Israeli public. Advertisement
Jerusalem saw the deal not as the end of the war but as a cessation of hostilities, according to a government official quoted by The Times of Israel, who said. “We don’t know how long it will last. It could be a month, it could be a year.”
Reports carried by Kan, Ynet and Haaretz, cited officials in Jerusalem, Washington and Beirut, said approval of the proposal was not final, that several sticking points remained to be resolved and that the state of play had been communicated to Lebanon.
The plan has provoked angry response from some quarters in Israel including Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir who called it “a big mistake” and a “missed opportunity to eradicate Hezbollah.”
Lebanon’s Deputy House Speaker, Bou Saab, told reporters at the end of a parliament session Monday that Lebanon would “not accept anything that harms its sovereignty,” accusing Israel of “escalating to obtain concessions” from Lebanon.
