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Israel continued to shell Beirut’s southern suburbs on Saturday and attacked a mosque in southern Lebanon as its forces battled Hizbollah militants on the ground in the border area.
Israeli warplanes also launched an attack on the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli for the first time, killing a Hamas commander, the Palestinian militant group said.
The Israeli army said it had targeted a mosque next to a hospital, adding it was being used as a command center by Hizbollah fighters.
A Hizbollah-affiliated hospital in southern Lebanon, The Martyr Salah Ghandour, said the hospital was attacked shortly after the Israeli military ordered an evacuation, according to a statement on the Lebanese state news agency on Saturday. . They said nine employees were injured in the attack in the town of Bint Jbeil.
A Health Ministry official said 50 medical staff have died in the past three days.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO director-general, said on Saturday that the capacity of the Lebanese health system was dwindling and that “the UN agency’s medical supplies cannot be delivered due to the near closure of Beirut airport completely”.
“WHO calls for urgent facilitation of flights to deliver medical supplies to Lebanon. Lives depend on it!” he said on X.
Israel has issued multiple evacuation orders in recent days, warning people in dozens of towns and villages across the south to move north. They gave similar orders in the fight against Hamas in Gaza before major attacks.
Iran-backed Hizbollah forces said there were clashes with Israeli troops around the Lebanese border town of Odeisseh. Lebanon’s official news agency reported shelling on Odeisseh and three other southern villages.
Israel has stepped up its offensive against Hizbollah in the past two weeks as it shifted its focus from Gaza to the northern front. It killed the Hizbollah leader Hassan Nasrallahconducted air strikes across Lebanon and sent troops into southern Lebanon for the first time in nearly two decades.
The escalation has increased fears of an all-out war in the Middle East. The region is preparing for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s response to Iran’s missile attack on Israel on Tuesday.
Tehran said the missile attack was in response to the assassination of Nasrallah and the killing of Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran in July.
According to the state news agency, Israel struck the southern suburbs on Saturday afternoon targeting the Palestinian refugee camp Borj al-Barajna with four rockets. Hizbollah said Israel bombed a conference center in the Dahiyeh neighborhood of southern Beirut overnight. The group has used the complex to host events, including rallies to broadcast Nasrallah’s speeches.
According to Lebanese authorities, nearly 2,000 people were killed in Israeli bombing of Lebanon over the past year, after Hizbollah began firing rockets into Israel in support of Hamas in Gaza. Lebanon’s health minister said the majority had died in the past two weeks.
More than 1.2 million people have been displaced, causing one of the worst crises to hit the country in decades.
Abbas Araghchi, Iran’s Foreign Minister, met Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in Damascus on Saturday, a day after visiting Beirut.
Israel “speaks no other language than war and coercion and continues atrocities in Beirut, southern Lebanon and Gaza every day,” Mr. Araghchi said. He added that he would continue to discuss ceasefire initiatives in Lebanon and Gaza with Syrian officials.
This week there have been signs that Israel has expanded its attacks on Hizbollah’s civilian infrastructure, also targeting the group’s leaders.
The movement is the dominant political force in Lebanon and has a vast network of social programs and business interests. On Thursday, Israel attacked a Hizbollah-linked medical facility in central Beirut, killing at least nine people, including medical staff, as well as a building used by the country’s media relations team. This group uses in the southern suburbs.
Hamas said the attack on a Palestinian refugee camp in the northern city of Tripoli killed Saeed Atallah Ali, commander of the Qassam Brigades, and his family in the early hours of Saturday. The second leader of Hamas, Mohammed Hussein al-Louise, was killed in an airstrike in the Bekaa Valley.
In northern Israel, air raid sirens sounded as Hizbollah launched a series of rockets. The Israel Defense Forces said the militant group fired 222 projectiles into Israel on Friday.
They claim to have killed 250 Hizbollah fighters, including four battalion commanders, since the start of their ground offensive in Lebanon this week.
Nine Israeli soldiers have been killed in clashes with Hizbollah in southern Lebanon as fighting intensifies.
Joe Biden has called on Israel to mount a “proportionate” response to Iran’s missile attacks and avoid targeting Iran’s nuclear facilities or oil infrastructure. But the president also made clear that the United States supports Israel’s military response.
“The Israelis have every right to respond to the vicious attacks against them, not just against the Iranians but against everyone from Hizbollah to the Houthis,” Biden said.
Additional reporting by Bita Ghaffari in Tehran
