People gather in front of destroyed buildings hit by an Israeli airstrike in central Beirut, Lebanon, on Oct. 10.Bilal Hussein/The Associated Press
Israeli air strikes hit different areas of central Beirut on Thursday evening, killing at least 22 people, Lebanon’s Health Ministry said, leaving two neighbourhoods smouldering and further escalating Israel’s bloody conflict with Iran-backed Hezbollah militants in Lebanon.
The air raid on central Beirut – the deadliest in over a year of war – apparently targeted two residential buildings in separate neighbourhoods simultaneously, according to an AP photographer at the scene. It brought down one eight-storey building and wiped out the lower floors of the other.
The Israeli military said it was looking into the reported strikes. Israeli air strikes have been far more common in Beirut’s tightly packed southern suburbs, where Hezbollah bases many of its operations.
After the strikes, Hezbollah’s Al Manar TV reported that an attempt to kill Wafiq Safa, a top security official with the group, had failed. It said that Mr. Safa had not been inside of either of the targeted buildings.
Thursday’s strikes followed a year of tit-for-tat exchanges between Hezbollah and Israel that boiled over into all-out war in recent weeks, with Israel carrying out waves of heavy strikes across Lebanon and launching a ground invasion. Hezbollah has expanded its rocket fire to more populated areas deeper inside Israel, causing few casualties but disrupting daily life.
Witnesses reported a large number of ambulances and people gathering in the rubble of two Beirut sites that were hit, in the Ras al-Nabaa neighbourhood and Burj Abi Haidar area.
The Lebanese Health Ministry said 22 people were killed and 117 others wounded, without elaborating on their identities. Recent Israeli air strikes in neighbourhoods adjoining Beirut, in particular the densely populated southern suburbs, have killed Hezbollah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, and other senior commanders.
Earlier on Thursday, an Israeli strike on a school sheltering displaced people in central Gaza killed at least 27 people, Palestinian medical officials said. The Israeli military said it targeted Palestinian militants, but people sheltering there said the strike hit a meeting of aid workers.
Palestinians inspect the damage of a school hit by an Israeli bombardment on Deir al-Balah, central Gaza Strip, on Oct. 10.Abdel Kareem Hana/The Associated Press
Israel has continued to strike at what it says are militant targets across the Palestinian enclave even as attention has shifted to its war against Hezbollah in Lebanon and rising tensions with Iran. The military launched a large-scale air and ground operation against Hamas in northern Gaza earlier this week.
In a separate development, the UN peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon said an Israeli tank fired on its headquarters in the town of Naqoura, hitting an observation tower and wounding two peacekeepers. The attack drew widespread condemnation and prompted the Italian Defence Ministry to summon Israel’s ambassador in protest.
Israeli military fired at peacekeeping force in Lebanon, injuring two, UN says
The Israeli military acknowledged opening fire at a UN base in southern Lebanon on Thursday and said it had ordered the peacekeepers to “remain in protected spaces.”
Hezbollah began firing rockets into Israel on Oct. 8, 2023, in support of Hamas and the Palestinians, drawing Israeli air strikes in retaliation.
Before the latest Beirut strikes, Lebanon’s crisis response unit said Israeli attacks over the past day had killed 28 people, bringing the total to 2,169 killed in Lebanon since the war erupted last October.
Hezbollah attacks have killed 28 civilians in northern Israel since the war began, as well as 39 Israeli soldiers, both in northern Israel since October, 2023, and in southern Lebanon since Israel launched its ground invasion on Sept. 30. Israel says the invasion, so far focused on a narrow strip along the border, aims to push militants back so that tens of thousands of Israelis can return to their homes in the north.