BEIRUT: The Israeli military said Hezbollah had fired dozens of rockets and several drones into northern Israel on Saturday, killing one person, with one drone directed at Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's holiday home, according to his spokesman. The volley from the Lebanese group came as health officials in Gaza, where Israel has been battling the Palestinian group Hamas for more than a year, said Israeli strikes had killed more than 30 people across the territory.
Pledges to keep fighting in Gaza and Lebanon have dashed hopes that might hasten an end to more than a year of escalating war in the Middle East.
As Israel continues military offensives on two fronts, Lebanon's health ministry said at least two people had been killed in an Israeli strike near the Christian-majority town of Jounieh, north of Beirut, in the first such attack on the area. Witnesses described passengers running from a car after a blast, then seeing the charred remains of one passenger after a second blast. The Israeli military was looking into the report of the strike, a spokesperson said. There was no immediate comment from Hezbollah, the Lebanese armed group that is fighting Israeli troops on Lebanon's southern border and whose top leadership has suffered blows from targeted Israeli strikes. At least four Israeli strikes hit Beirut's southern suburbs on Saturday afternoon, according to witnesses, after an Israeli military spokesperson issued warnings on social media platform X for two locations in the area.
In northern Israel, some of the rockets were intercepted, but one hit a residential building, according to police. One person was killed, and at least nine people were injured in different locations, the Israeli ambulance service said. Air raid sirens sent people running to shelters. Netanyahu's spokesman said the prime minister was not in the vicinity of his holiday home in Caesarea and there were no casualties.
Hezbollah has been trading fire with Israel since the war between Israel and Palestinians began in Gaza last October. Nearly three weeks ago, Israel launched a ground assault inside Lebanon in an attempt to stabilise the border region for its citizens who had fled the fighting. Some 2,400 people have been killed in Lebanon, most of them in the last month, according to Lebanon's health ministry, while 59 people have been killed in northern Israel and the occupied Golan Heights, according to Israeli authorities. — Reuters
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