Photo: Ibrahim Amro Agence France-Presse A strike hit the very heart of the Lebanese capital, in the Bachoura district, on the night of Wednesday to Thursday.
Laure Al Khoury – Agence France-Presse and Benoît Finck – Agence France-Presse respectively in Beirut and Jerusalem
Published at 1:07
- Middle East
An Israeli strike on a Hezbollah relief center in the heart of Beirut left six dead on the night of Wednesday to Thursday, after a day marked by ground fighting in southern Lebanon where eight Israeli soldiers died.
Faced with the risk of widespread conflict in the region following Tuesday's Iranian strikes on Israel, US President Joe Biden said on Wednesday that he was opposed to the idea of Israeli strikes against Iranian nuclear facilities.
Israel continued its offensive in Lebanon overnight, with 17 raids on Beirut and its southern suburbs, according to the official Lebanese agency NNA.
For the second time, a strike hit the very heart of the capital, hitting Hezbollah's “civil protection center” in the Bachoura district, according to a source close to the pro-Iranian movement. The death toll stands at six dead and seven injured, the Health Ministry said.
AFP journalists in Beirut heard an explosion and reported that buildings shook, before ambulances headed to the scene.
The Israeli army also issued a new evacuation order during the night concerning the Shiite sectors of Haret Hreik, Bourj al-Barajneh and Hadath Gharb, in the south of the capital.
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Strike on Damascus
Israeli forces, whose bombings of Hezbollah strongholds in Lebanon have killed hundreds of people over the past week, also killed three people in Damascus on Wednesday, including the son-in-law of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, who was himself assassinated by Israel on September 27 in the suburbs of Beirut, an NGO reported.
“Hassan Jaafar al-Qasir, son-in-law of Hassan Nasrallah, is one of the two Lebanese victims of the Israeli raid that targeted an apartment in a residential building in the Mazzeh neighborhood of Damascus,” the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported.
A source close to Hezbollah confirmed this information to AFP and specified that Hassan Jaafar al-Qasir was the brother of Jaafar al-Qasir, who was responsible for the transfer Iran launched its second direct attack on Israel on Tuesday, followed by threats of cross-retaliation between the two countries.
“Iran has made a grave mistake […] and will pay the price,” warned Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Iranian President Massoud Pezeshkian, for his part, promised “a stronger response” in the event of retaliation, while assuring that his country was not “seeking war.”
200% Deposit Bonus up to €3,000 180% First Deposit Bonus up to $20,000The military escalation between Israel on the one hand, and Iran and Hezbollah on the other, raises fears that the situation in the Middle East could spiral out of control, one year after the unprecedented attack carried out by Palestinian Hamas, an ally of Hezbollah, on Israeli soil on October 7, 2023, which triggered war in the Gaza Strip.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, on Wednesday castigated “the sickening cycle” of violence in a region on the brink of a “precipice”, before the Security Council meeting in emergency mode.
World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus warned on X that Lebanese hospitals were “overwhelmed with injured patients.” “The health system has been weakened by successive crises and is struggling to cope with the immense needs,” he added.
According to the Lebanese Crisis Center, more than 1,928 people have been killed in Lebanon since October 2023.
Since mid-September, Israel has intensified its military operations on the northern front, in order to weaken Hezbollah and allow the return of tens of thousands of residents of the border regions with Lebanon displaced by the Lebanese movement's incessant rocket fire for a year.
“Ghost town”
The Israeli army announced on Wednesday the deaths of eight soldiers, killed since the start of its ground operations Monday, which it describes as “limited”, in southern Lebanon.
The Israeli army called for the “immediate” evacuation of villages in southern Lebanon while new airstrikes targeted the southern suburbs of Beirut, deserted by its residents.
Three new strikes hit these neighborhoods Wednesday evening, according to witnesses and AFP.
“The neighborhood has become a ghost town,” said Mohammad Cheaïto, a 31-year-old driver who decided to stay, but asked his parents, sister and nephews, who had fled southern Lebanon to take refuge with him, to leave for a safer place. sure.
Footage released by the Israeli military shows soldiers on Lebanese soil, moving on foot through villages and mountainous areas. The army announced that it had deployed a second division to support the troops already on the ground.
In Lebanon, more than 1,000 people have been killed, according to the Ministry of Health, since the explosions of Hezbollah transmission devices on September 17 and 18, attributed to Israel, and the start of massive aerial bombardments on September 23, which mainly targeted the south and east of the country as well as the southern suburbs of Beirut.
The government estimated on Wednesday that around 1.2 million people were displaced by the bombardments.
The “heart” of Israel targeted
Meanwhile, Israel and Tehran have exchanged threats after the massive attack launched Tuesday by Iran to avenge the death of Hassan Nasrallah and that of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, killed on July 31 in an attack in Tehran, attributed to Israel by Iran and Hamas.
Around 200 missiles were fired by Tehran, many of which were intercepted by the anti-missile system, said the Israeli army, which benefited from the support of American and British forces, according to the Pentagon and London.
This attack, the second since April, injured two people in Israel and killed a Palestinian in the occupied West Bank, according to emergency services and a Palestinian official.
“This is not going to end well” “, “restraint is not Mr. Netanyahu's strong point,” political analyst Jordan Barkin commented for AFP.
In Tehran, Mansour Firouzabadi, a 45-year-old nurse, said he was “really worried,” hoping “that the United States will stop supporting Israel and that Israel will not retaliate.”
The armed wing of Hamas also claimed responsibility on Wednesday for an attack committed the day before in Tel Aviv, in which seven people were killed with automatic weapons and knives.
At the same time, the Israeli army announced on Wednesday that it had attacked two schools in the north of the Gaza Strip, and a third in the center, which it said were used by Hamas as command centers.