Lebanon says two dead in Israeli strike as Hezbollah claims attacks

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BEIRUT (AFP) – Lebanon’s Health Ministry said an Israeli strike killed two people in south Lebanon yesterday, while Hezbollah claimed attacks on troops and military positions in northern Israel, including with drones.

Lebanon’s official National News Agency reported Israeli shelling and raids on several southern areas, saying “enemy drone strikes” killed two people in Hula.

Hezbollah said yesterday it launched a “simultaneous air attack” with “explosive-laden drones” on two Israeli military positions – a barracks near the border and a base near the coastal town of Acre, around 15 kilometres from the frontier.

It said it came “in response” to an Israeli “attack and assassination” in south Lebanon’s Tyre area. The Israeli military had said on Saturday its aircraft “eliminated” a Hezbollah operative in the Tyre area, describing him as a “commander” in the group’s elite Radwan force.

Overnight, Hezbollah said its fighters targeted a group of Israeli soldiers “infiltrating” near the border and confronted them “with rocket weapons and artillery, forcing them to return”.

Also yesterday morning, Hezbollah claimed a rocket and artillery attack on another Israeli barracks in stated retaliation for “Israeli enemy attacks”.

The cross-border violence has killed some 584 people in Lebanon, mostly Hezbollah fighters but including at least 128 civilians, according to an AFP tally.

On the Israeli side, including in the annexed Golan Heights, 22 soldiers and 26 civilians have been killed, according to army figures.

Relatives mourn over the bodies of members of the same family, including two children, killed in an Israeli strike in the Wadi al-Kafur area of the southern Lebanese Nabatiyeh district. PHOTO: AP