Israeli Strike Kills Woman and Child in South Lebanon

Smoke billows from the site of an Israeli airstrike on the southern Lebanese village of Khiam near the border with Israel on February 21, 2024, amid ongoing cross-border tensions as fighting continues between Israel and Hamas militants in Gaza. (AFP)
Smoke billows from the site of an Israeli airstrike on the southern Lebanese village of Khiam near the border with Israel on February 21, 2024, amid ongoing cross-border tensions as fighting continues between Israel and Hamas militants in Gaza. (AFP)
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Israeli Strike Kills Woman and Child in South Lebanon

Smoke billows from the site of an Israeli airstrike on the southern Lebanese village of Khiam near the border with Israel on February 21, 2024, amid ongoing cross-border tensions as fighting continues between Israel and Hamas militants in Gaza. (AFP)
Smoke billows from the site of an Israeli airstrike on the southern Lebanese village of Khiam near the border with Israel on February 21, 2024, amid ongoing cross-border tensions as fighting continues between Israel and Hamas militants in Gaza. (AFP)

An Israeli air strike killed a woman and a child in south Lebanon on Wednesday, sources in Lebanon said, days after Hezbollah said it would inflict a price on Israel for killing civilians in the conflict across the Israeli-Lebanese border.

The woman and girl were killed in the strike near Majdal Zoun, a village some 6 km (4 miles) from the border, according to two security sources and a medical source.

The father of the six-year-old girl killed said she had asked to visit her village, which they had fled from after the eruption of hostilities last year, in comments broadcast by al-Akhbar newspaper.

The Iran-backed Hezbollah movement has been trading fire with Israel since the Oct. 7 attack by its Palestinian ally Hamas on southern Israel in a campaign Hezbollah says aims to support Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.

The Israeli army said its warplanes had struck three Hezbollah operational command centers in southern Lebanon.

It said Israeli army artillery had also fired "to remove a threat" in the areas of Alma al-Shaab and Dhayra, both villages at the border.

The Israeli army did not respond to a request for comment about reports of the strike in Majdal Zoun.

Hezbollah signaled on Friday it would escalate attacks on Israel in response to the deaths of 10 Lebanese civilians in Israeli attacks last week.

Hezbollah announced more than half a dozen attacks on Israeli positions on Wednesday.

Israeli strikes since Oct. 8 have killed some 50 civilians in Lebanon, in addition to nearly 200 Hezbollah fighters.

Attacks from Lebanon into Israel have killed a dozen Israeli soldiers and five civilians.

The violence has uprooted tens of thousands of people on both sides of the border.



With Nowhere Else to Hide, Gazans Shelter in Former Prison

24 July 2024, Palestinian Territories, Khan Younis: Displaced Palestinians stay in Asda prison in Khan Younis after the Israeli army ordered them to leave their homes in the towns of Abasan, Bani Suhaila, Ma'an, Al-Zana and a number of other villages, amid Israel-Hamas conflict. (dpa)
24 July 2024, Palestinian Territories, Khan Younis: Displaced Palestinians stay in Asda prison in Khan Younis after the Israeli army ordered them to leave their homes in the towns of Abasan, Bani Suhaila, Ma'an, Al-Zana and a number of other villages, amid Israel-Hamas conflict. (dpa)
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With Nowhere Else to Hide, Gazans Shelter in Former Prison

24 July 2024, Palestinian Territories, Khan Younis: Displaced Palestinians stay in Asda prison in Khan Younis after the Israeli army ordered them to leave their homes in the towns of Abasan, Bani Suhaila, Ma'an, Al-Zana and a number of other villages, amid Israel-Hamas conflict. (dpa)
24 July 2024, Palestinian Territories, Khan Younis: Displaced Palestinians stay in Asda prison in Khan Younis after the Israeli army ordered them to leave their homes in the towns of Abasan, Bani Suhaila, Ma'an, Al-Zana and a number of other villages, amid Israel-Hamas conflict. (dpa)

After weeks of Israeli bombardment left them with nowhere else to go, hundreds of Palestinians have ended up in a former Gaza prison built to hold murderers and thieves.

Yasmeen al-Dardasi said she and her family passed wounded people they were unable to help as they evacuated from a district in the southern city of Khan Younis towards its Central Correction and Rehabilitation Facility.

They spent a day under a tree before moving on to the former prison, where they now live in a prayer room. It offers protection from the blistering sun, but not much else.

Dardasi's husband has a damaged kidney and just one lung, but no mattress or blanket.

"We are not settled here either," said Dardasi, who like many Palestinians fears she will be uprooted once again.

Israel has said it goes out of its way to protect civilians in its war with the Palestinian group Hamas, which runs Gaza and led the attack on Israel on Oct. 7 that sparked the latest conflict.

Palestinians, many of whom have been displaced several times, say nowhere is free of Israeli bombardment, which has reduced much of Gaza to rubble.

An Israeli air strike killed at least 90 Palestinians in a designated humanitarian zone in the Al-Mawasi area on July 13, the territory's health ministry said, in an attack that Israel said targeted Hamas' elusive military chief Mohammed Deif.

On Thursday, Gaza's health ministry said Israeli military strikes on areas in eastern Khan Younis had killed 14 people.

Entire neighborhoods have been flattened in one of the most densely populated places in the world, where poverty and unemployment have long been widespread.

According to the United Nations, nine in ten people across Gaza are now internally displaced.

Israeli soldiers told Saria Abu Mustafa and her family that they should flee for safety as tanks were on their way, she said. The family had no time to change so they left in their prayer clothes.

After sleeping outside on sandy ground, they too found refuge in the prison, among piles of rubble and gaping holes in buildings from the battles which were fought there. Inmates had been released long before Israel attacked.

"We didn't take anything with us. We came here on foot, with children walking with us," she said, adding that many of the women had five or six children with them and that water was hard to find.

She held her niece, who was born during the conflict, which has killed her father and brothers.

When Hamas-led gunmen burst into southern Israel from Gaza on Oct. 7 they killed 1,200 people and took more than 250 people hostage, according to Israeli tallies.

More than 39,000 Palestinians have been killed in the air and ground offensive Israel launched in response, Palestinian health officials say.

Hana Al-Sayed Abu Mustafa arrived at the prison after being displaced six times.

If Egyptian, US and Qatari mediators fail to secure a ceasefire they have long said is close, she and other Palestinians may be on the move once again. "Where should we go? All the places that we go to are dangerous," she said.