Border Warfare Escalates as Hezbollah Launches Rockets at Israel, Israel Strikes Lebanon: Latest Update

Lebanon’s caretaker prime minister Najib Mikati met cabinet ministers at a session of the national emergency committee. Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah will speak on television later on Sunday, the group said.

Flights to and from Ben Gurion airport in Tel Aviv were suspended for around 90 minutes.

Some flights to and from Beirut were halted, stranding passengers. “I just want to get out of here by any means possible,” said Rana Saade, a Lebanese woman living in New Jersey.

In northern Israel, warning sirens sounded and explosions were heard in several areas as Israel’s Iron Dome aerial defence system shot down rockets coming from southern Lebanon.

The Israeli military told people to limit gatherings, a restriction it later lifted, and said people could go to work if they could reach air raid shelters quickly. Israeli media said the barrage hitting northern areas had damaged houses.

“Israel should, as it did this morning, deliver a pre-emptive strike. But if Hezbollah continues Israel should strike very hard to remove the threat from Hezbollah once and for all,” said Yuval Peleg, 73, from Haifa.

Israel’s military said a naval soldier was killed and two wounded.

A security source in Lebanon said at least 40 Israeli strikes had hit various towns in the country’s south in one of the densest bombardments since hostilities began in October.

Hezbollah said the strikes killed two of its fighters in al-Tiri. The Hezbollah-allied Shi’ite Muslim group Amal said a strike on Khiam killed one of its fighters.

A resident of the southern Lebanese town of Zibqeen told Reuters he had awakened “to the sound of planes and the loud explosions of rockets – even before the dawn prayer. It felt like the apocalypse.”

REGIONAL CONFLICT RISK

The White House said U.S. President Joe Biden was following events. “We will keep supporting Israel’s right to defend itself, and we will keep working for regional stability,” National Security Council spokesperson Sean Savett said.

The United States was not involved in Israel’s strikes on Sunday, but provided some intelligence about incoming Hezbollah attacks, a U.S. official said.

The U.N. peacekeeping force in Lebanon and the U.N.’s special coordinator’s office in the country called on all sides to cease fire, calling the developments “worrying”.

Egypt, one of the mediators in Gaza ceasefire talks, warned against the dangers of a new war front opening in Lebanon.

Hezbollah fired missiles at Israel immediately after the Oct. 7 attacks by Hamas gunmen on Israel. Hezbollah and Israel have been exchanging fire constantly ever since, while avoiding a major escalation as war rages in Gaza to the south.

That precarious balance appeared to shift after the strike in the Golan Heights, for which Hezbollah denied responsibility, and the subsequent assassination of Shukr, one of Hezbollah’s most senior military commanders.

Shukr’s death in an air strike was quickly followed by the assassination of Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran, which led to vows of reprisal against Israel by Iran. (Reuters)