Israeli airstrikes breach new areas of Lebanon, kill 23, displace almost 500,000 people so far

Airstrikes began to reach deeper into Lebanon as the Israeli military continued to ramp up the intensity of its escalation on the country on Wednesday morning.

A raid struck a residential building in the town of Joun on Wednesday morning, killing four people and injuring others, according to the health minister. 

The bombing was the first since October to reach the Shouf Governorate, a mountainous area which lies significantly further northwest in the country than the targets of earlier strikes in the south, the Beqaa Valley and Baalbek.

The Lebanese Shia town of Maaysrah in the Keserwan region north of Beirut was also reported to have been struck by Israel on Wednesday, killing three people according to the Lebanese Health Ministry.

Israel’s military also conducted a raid Tuesday night on the coastal city of Jieh, around 23 kilometers to Beirut’s south, with echoes from the strike audible across the capital. The missile reduced structures in the area to rubble, leaving the sea visible through a gap in the huddle of the buildings along the coast and the adjacent cafes damaged by the force of the blast.

Another airstrike on the Beirut suburb of Dahiyeh struck a residential building in the Ghobeiry area on Tuesday evening, killing six including Hezbollah commander Ibrahim Qubaisi, security sources told Reuters. Hezbollah later confirmed the death of Qubaisi, a leading figure in its rocket and missile division. Fifteen other people were injured in the targeting of Ghobeiry, according to the Lebanese Health Ministry and civil defense in the area who finished work to retrieve people from under the rubble on Wednesday morning.

Israeli airstrikes also continued over the course of Tuesday night and Wednesday morning to sweep through villages and towns in the south Lebanon and Nabatieh governorates, the Beqaa Valley and Baalbek. 

Airstrikes on Bint Jbeil and Ain Qana towns in south Lebanon, led to six deaths and 12 injuries, according to several statements of the Health Ministry.

The latest official death toll issued by the Lebanese health minister on Tuesday afternoon said that 558 people have been killed and over 1,800 wounded since Monday, while the intensified strikes on Wednesday morning killed at least 23 people and left 100  injured, according to the Health Ministry's latest update. 

Since Tuesday, the Israeli military launched airstrikes on separate areas in Lebanon, most of them concentrated in southern areas, especially in the Beqaa region and Baalbek, with reports coming out of al-Ansar town in the former and and from Nahleh town’s road in the latter, as well as the southern side extending toward Duris town.

The military escalation and bombardment has displaced nearly 500,000 people, Lebanese Foreign Minister Abdullah Bou Habib said on Tuesday. The Lebanese National Committee for the Coordination of Disaster Response Operations has opened 250 schools across the country to provide shelter to the displaced, although the availability of provisions is poor, according to a Mada Masr correspondent in Saida, a coastal city to which many have fled from villages in governorates in the south.

In the Beqaa Valley on Tuesday, Israeli forces dropped leaflets ordering people to evacuate their homes. Hezbollah’s public relations department as well as other groups asked citizens to neither open nor share barcodes which were printed on the leaflets, given the “great danger” they pose, explaining in the statement that these barcodes aim to retrieve all the information saved on the person's electronic device. 

The Israeli army continues to target residential buildings and civilian areas in the name of destroying cruise missiles that it claims Hezbollah hides “inside the homes of Lebanese civilians,” a similar narrative to how it previously justified the targeting of civilian areas in Gaza. 

On Tuesday night, Hezbollah continued to intensify its operations against Israel. The group announced for the first time that its operations would now be conducted in defense of Lebanon, a new target in addition to its continuing support of the Palestinian people — the reason it first cited when it launched rockets toward Israeli-held territory on October 8.

At around 6 am, Hezbollah targeted Tel Aviv for the first time since October. Explosions were visible in the air over the Israeli capital as its defense missiles intercepted the blows. The group said in a statement that it had targeted the suburbs of the Israeli capital using Qadr 1 missiles, a ballistic missile developed by Iran which it has not previously deployed. The target, the group said, was the location of the headquarters of Israel’s intelligence force, the Mossad. 

Hezbollah described the site as “the headquarters responsible for assassinating leaders and blowing up pagers and wireless devices.”

The group also said it used Fadi 1 missiles on Tuesday night to target the Ilaniya Base, which is connected with the Israeli military’s northern command. Hezbollah began to use Fadi 1 missiles on Sunday night for the first time since October.

Israel began to heighten operations on the country last week, detonating thousands of pagers and wireless devices used by Hezbollah members and employees of Hezbollah-run institutions over two consecutive days, leaving hundreds of people with life-changing injuries. At least 20 people were killed in the explosions.

It also launched an operation it described as “targeted,” striking a residential building in Beirut on Saturday, killing Hezbollah senior commanders Ibrahim Aqil and Ahmed Mahmoud Wehbe, and more than 54 others, including children and women. Sixty-eight people were injured. 

558 people were killed by Israeli airstrikes as ofTuesday, the Lebanese Health Minister said on the same day, including 50 children and 94 women, along with the injury of 1,835 others.

The Israeli military conducted widespread  airstrikes on Monday, which it said it carried out “in anticipation of” Hezbollah attacks on Israel, and killed at least 100 people, leaving 400 injured.

In a statement on Monday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that Israeli forces were targeting Hezbollah, not the Lebanese people, adding that Israel would no longer tolerate rockets fired at northern Israeli areas where residents have evacuated. "Our war is not with you, our war is with Hezbollah. Nasrallah is leading you to the brink of the abyss,” he said, urging the Lebanese people to free themselves “from Nasrallah’s grip.”

Israeli public broadcaster Kan speculated on Tuesday night about whether the military would launch a ground invasion of Lebanon. 

Israeli officials have identified Lebanon as a new strategic priority while continuing their aerial attacks on the Gaza Strip. Officials have expressed the aim for the return of 60,000 Israelis to the country’s north after they left the region when Hezbollah began its attacks in October.

US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan expressed the United States’ determination to reach a ceasefire in Gaza in a statement on Tuesday, to release prisoners and avoid a war between Israel and Hezbollah.

Prior to the escalation which began last week, Israeli airstrikes had killed 627 people in Lebanon, including at least 141 civilians, according to an AFP tally.