First Israeli strike on Beirut since October 7

Photo: Hassan Ammar Associated Press Lebanese people were taking in the scale of the destruction of the site where Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah was killed on Friday, his death confirmed on Saturday. After destroying the “underground headquarters” in the suburbs of Beirut, where the leader of the Islamist militia was holed up, the Israeli army continued to carry out several violent raids in Lebanon, including at least one on the capital. About a hundred people died in these attacks.

Sofiane Alsaar – Agence France-Presse and Benoit Finck – Agence France-Presse respectively in Beirut and Jerusalem

Published yesterday at 8:47 AM Updated yesterday at 9:40 PM

• Middle East

A Lebanese security source said that the Israeli army carried out its first strike on Beirut on Monday, despite Israel and Hezbollah having been exchanging fire for a year, bringing the number of deaths in Lebanon in the last 24 hours to at least 109.

While the Israeli army has repeatedly pounded the southern suburbs of Beirut, a stronghold of the Islamist movement, in recent days, this is the first time it has targeted the capital within the city walls since the start of the front opened by Hezbollah on October 8, the day after the unprecedented attack by the Palestinian Hamas in Israel.

According to this Lebanese security source, “at least four people were killed in an Israeli drone strike that targeted a home belonging to Jamaa Islamiya in Beirut intra-muros”. This Lebanese Sunni Islamist group supported Hezbollah in its operations carried out in northern Israel “in support” of Hamas.

Videos relayed by local television channels showed the partially leveled floor of the building targeted by the strike.

The strike comes as the Israeli army maintains its military pressure against Hezbollah for the seventh day in a row with heavy strikes on its strongholds across Lebanon, two days after killing its leader, Hassan Nasrallah. The raids killed at least 109 people on Sunday, according to the Lebanese Health Ministry.

“Great concern”

Israel said it attacked “dozens of terrorist targets” of the Shiite movement in Lebanon on Sunday, including rocket launch sites and military installations. On Sunday evening, the Israeli military said it had carried out about 120 additional “large-scale” strikes in the country.

On another front, Israel has carried out deadly raids against Houthi rebel targets in Yemen, killing four people, the day after a strike on Tel Aviv airport claimed by these pro-Iranian insurgents.

These strikes targeted ports and power plants in the Hodeida region (west), the main entry point for goods and humanitarian aid intended for areas controlled by Yemeni rebels, indicated the Al-Massirah television channel, which reports to the insurgents.

“No place is too far” for Israel, warned Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant.

This situation raises fears of a conflagration regional.

A total war in the Middle East “must be avoided,” US President Joe Biden has declared, after calling Nasrallah's death “a measure of justice.”

Saudi Arabia, a major player in the region and influential in Lebanon, called for its part on Monday for respect for the “sovereignty and territorial integrity” of this country, expressing its “great concern” over the intensification of the conflict between Hezbollah and Israel, which is also in the midst of an offensive against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

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“We are afraid”

The Israeli army said it had killed along with Hassan Nasrallah, during its operation called “New Order”, “more than 20 other terrorists of different ranks, present in the underground headquarters [of Hezbollah] located under civilian buildings and who directed terrorist operations against Israel”.

Israel claimed that “most” of Hezbollah's senior leaders had been killed in recent months during operations by its forces.

The death of Hassan Nasrallah, considered the most powerful man in Lebanon, constitutes a major victory for Israel against Iran and its allies, deals a devastating blow to the allied Palestinian Hamas movement, at war with Israel in Gaza, and plunges the region into the unknown.

Despite the incessant blows dealt by Israel, the movement announced that it had fired rockets against the north of the country. About eight projectiles fell on vacant lots near Tiberias, according to the army.

“We have settled our accounts with the person responsible for the murder of countless Israelis and many citizens of other countries,” said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

“We are afraid that there will be a total escalation,” said Matan Sofer, a resident of the Israeli town of Rosh Pina, about thirty kilometers from the Lebanese border.

Photo: Mohammed Sawaf Agence France-Presse A man recites verses from the Quran, Islam’s holy book, during a memorial ceremony for Hassan Nasrallah, the former leader of the Lebanese Shiite group Hezbollah, who was killed in an Israeli airstrike in Beirut days earlier, in the holy city of Karbala, central Iraq, on September 29, 2024.

Waiting for a successor

“Nasrallah’s line” “will continue, and his sacred goal will be achieved with the liberation of Jerusalem,” said Iran, Israel’s arch-enemy, which funds and arms Hezbollah.

Tehran also said that the death of an Iranian general killed alongside Nasrallah “would not go unanswered.”

Hassan Nasrallah, 64, has led Hezbollah since 1992 and was a religious man who was the subject of a veritable cult of personality among his supporters, mainly within the Shiite Muslim community from which he came.

His cousin Hashem Safieddine, a prominent figure in the party, is seen as a potential successor.

The attack on Nasrallah shows “the extent to which Israel has infiltrated Hezbollah,” says James Dorsey, a researcher at the Middle East Institute at the National University of Singapore.

“We will either see an unprecedented reaction from Hezbollah […] or its total defeat,” says Heiko Wimmen, a regional specialist at the International Crisis Group.

Hundreds of thousands displaced

The first senior Western diplomat to visit Lebanon since the intensification of Israeli strikes, the head of French diplomacy, Jean-Noël Barrot, arrived in Beirut in the evening.

According to Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati, nearly 1 million people may have been displaced by Israeli bombings, the largest population displacement in the country's history, according to him.

The World Food Programme has announced an emergency operation to provide food aid to 1 million people.

The Shiite movement opened a front against Israel at the start of the war in Gaza, triggered by an attack by the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas on Israeli territory on October 7, 2023.

After a year of cross-border firefights, the Israeli army intensified its bombings against Hezbollah from September 23.

Israel says it wants to stop the Lebanese movement's fire toward the north of its territory and thus allow the return of tens of thousands of residents forced to flee.

At the same time, its army is relentlessly continuing its deadly offensive against Hamas in the besieged and devastated Gaza Strip.