Violence Escalates between Israel, Lebanon’s Hezbollah

 Smoke billows across the horizon along the hills in southern Lebanon from Israeli bombardment from a position along the border in northern Israel on December 10, 2023. (AFP)
Smoke billows across the horizon along the hills in southern Lebanon from Israeli bombardment from a position along the border in northern Israel on December 10, 2023. (AFP)
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Violence Escalates between Israel, Lebanon’s Hezbollah

 Smoke billows across the horizon along the hills in southern Lebanon from Israeli bombardment from a position along the border in northern Israel on December 10, 2023. (AFP)
Smoke billows across the horizon along the hills in southern Lebanon from Israeli bombardment from a position along the border in northern Israel on December 10, 2023. (AFP)

Violence escalated at Lebanon's border with Israel on Sunday as Hezbollah launched explosive drones and powerful missiles at Israeli positions and Israeli air strikes rocked several towns and villages in south Lebanon.

Israel and the Iran-backed Hezbollah have been trading fire since the war in Gaza erupted two months ago, in their worst hostilities since a 2006 conflict. The violence has largely been contained to the border area.

Israeli attacks in south Lebanon included air strikes on the town of Aitaroun which destroyed and damaged numerous houses, Lebanon's National News Agency said. It did not say if there were any casualties.

The Israeli army did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Senior Hezbollah politician Hassan Fadlallah, in a statement sent to Reuters, said Israeli air strikes were a "new escalation" to which the group was responding with new types of attacks, be it "in the nature of the weapons (used) or the targeted sites".

The Israeli army earlier said "suspicious aerial targets" had crossed from Lebanon and two were intercepted. Two Israeli soldiers were moderately wounded and a number of others lightly injured from shrapnel and smoke inhalation, it said.

Israeli fighter jets carried out "an extensive series of strikes on Hezbollah terror targets in Lebanese territory", it said. Sirens sounded in Israel at several locations at the border.

In Beirut, residents saw what appeared to be two warplanes streaking across a clear blue sky, leaving vapor trails behind them.

Hezbollah statements say its attacks aim to support Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.

Senior Hezbollah official Sheikh Ali Damoush said in a speech on Sunday the group would continue in its effort to "exhaust the enemy, and will not stop unless the aggression against Gaza and Lebanon stops".

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has warned that Beirut would be turned "into Gaza" if Hezbollah started an all-out war.

In one of several attacks announced by Hezbollah on Sunday, the group said it had launched the explosive drones at an Israeli command position near Ya'ara. In another, Hezbollah said it had fired Burkan (Volcano) missiles, which carry hundreds of kilograms of explosives.

Israeli air strikes were also reported on the outskirts of the Lebanese village of Yaroun, not far from the location of another of the Israeli positions Hezbollah said it had targeted on Sunday.

Those air strikes broke windows of houses, shops and a school in the nearby village of Rmeich, Toni Elias, a priest in Rmeich, told Reuters by phone.

Violence at the border has killed more than 120 people in Lebanon, including 85 Hezbollah fighters and 16 civilians. In Israel, the hostilities have killed seven soldiers and four civilians.



Israel Strikes a Charity Kitchen and a Tent in Gaza, Killing at Least 9

 Palestinians walk next to a tent camp for displaced by the Israeli air and ground offensive on the Gaza Strip in west of Gaza Strip, Tuesday, March 25, 2025. (AP)
Palestinians walk next to a tent camp for displaced by the Israeli air and ground offensive on the Gaza Strip in west of Gaza Strip, Tuesday, March 25, 2025. (AP)
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Israel Strikes a Charity Kitchen and a Tent in Gaza, Killing at Least 9

 Palestinians walk next to a tent camp for displaced by the Israeli air and ground offensive on the Gaza Strip in west of Gaza Strip, Tuesday, March 25, 2025. (AP)
Palestinians walk next to a tent camp for displaced by the Israeli air and ground offensive on the Gaza Strip in west of Gaza Strip, Tuesday, March 25, 2025. (AP)

At least nine Palestinians were killed Wednesday in two separate Israeli airstrikes in central Gaza, medics said.

One strike hit a group of Palestinians gathered outside a charity providing hot meals in the Nuseirat refugee camp.

At least five people, including a woman and her adult daughter, were killed in the strike, according to the Awda hospital, which received the casualties.

A separate strike on a tent killed a father, mother and their daughter in the town of Zwaeida, according to the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in the nearby city of Deir al-Balah. The hospital said the explosion tore the man's body in half.

The Israeli military had no immediate comment.