Israeli sniper wounds barber on Lebanon border

Special Israeli sniper wounds barber on Lebanon border
Civil Defense teams inspect a charred car that was hit by an Israeli drone strike on the road leading to the southern Lebanese coastal town of Naqoura, on the border with Israel, Sept. 2, 2024. (AFP)
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Updated 03 September 2024
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Israeli sniper wounds barber on Lebanon border

Israeli sniper wounds barber on Lebanon border
  • A civilian who works as a barber contracted with the Spanish battalion in UNIFIL was wounded by Israeli sniper fire on the Abil Al-Qamh road
  • Hezbollah MP: If the party’s drones reached the outskirts of Tel Aviv once, they can reach it anytime

BEIRUT: The Israeli army has begun using snipers across the land border with Lebanon to target passersby on adjacent roads after it paralyzed life in the border villages through the systematic destruction of their neighborhoods with airstrikes, drones, and incendiary bombs for nearly 11 months.

On Tuesday, a civilian who works as a barber contracted with the Spanish battalion in UNIFIL, the UN peacekeeping mission in Lebanon, was wounded by Israeli sniper fire on the Abil Al-Qamh road.

The barber was hit by several bullets in his side while waiting in a Rapid-model car with a private license plate at a specific point, where a patrol from the Spanish battalion was supposed to pick him up, as usual, and take him to his workplace at the UNIFIL headquarters opposite the Metula settlement.

He was transported to Marjayoun Governmental Hospital for treatment.

This is the second time contractors working with UNIFIL have been targeted in less than 24 hours.

On Monday morning, two civilians working for a company providing services to UNIFIL were killed on the Naqoura road by an Israeli drone strike that targeted their car.

Hostile operations between the Israeli army and Hezbollah have continued at a relatively lower rate.

Israeli airstrikes targeted the outskirts of the towns of Aita Al-Shaab and Markaba, while another strike hit the heights of Jabal Al-Rihane.

The Israeli army also opened fire with heavy machine guns at dawn toward Ras Naqoura and Labouneh. The town of Khiam was subjected to heavy artillery shelling.

Hezbollah’s military media announced that the party targeted in the afternoon “surveillance equipment at Al-Jardah site with appropriate weapons, hitting it directly and destroying it.”

MP Hassan Ezzeddine, a member of Hezbollah’s parliamentary bloc, said the party “managed to impose a deterrence equation with the Israeli enemy through its response to the assassination of military commander Fuad Shukr after the party’s drones reached the outskirts of Tel Aviv.” He added: “Whoever reaches there once, can reach it every time.”

Meanwhile, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs stated in an updated report on the situation in southern Lebanon that “the total number of civilian deaths since Oct. 8, 2023, has reached at least 133, while the Lebanese Ministry of Health reported that the total number of casualties since that date has reached 2,412, including 564 deaths.”

The report revealed that “the number of displaced individuals from the border towns has increased to 111,940, with 94 percent of them originating from the districts of Bint Jbeil, Marjeyoun, and Tyre.”

According to the report, “tensions in southern Lebanon reached a critical level over the past three weeks as the conflict intensified, increasing the risk to civilians.

“The security situation along the Blue Line remains unstable, with approximately 150,000 residents living within 10 km of the border facing daily shelling and airstrikes.”

The report indicates that “the Inter-Sector Coordination Groups have been working since August to develop a contingency plan in response to the escalating situation in southern Lebanon.

“The groups are focusing their efforts on assessing the capabilities of various sectors. The UN (Office) for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs has assisted in humanitarian sectors to address the current circumstances in Lebanon.

“This includes cash assistance to 290 farmers (80 in the south and 210 in Nabatieh) to support their livelihoods and agricultural assets.

“Additionally, 6,700 individuals received emergency cash assistance since June, while 1,614 Lebanese citizens and 778 Syrian refugees were granted cash aid to secure shelter from October 2023 until the report’s preparation date.”

The assistance extended to the education sector, where 10,250 displaced children received emergency scholarships and were re-enrolled in schools to resume their educational programs.

Additionally, food aid was provided to displaced individuals residing in refugee centers, as well as those who were taken in by relatives and families in the regions of Tyre, Sidon, Nabatieh, Beirut, Mount Lebanon, and Baalbek-Hermel.


Iran warns will defend itself after Israeli strikes

Iran warns will defend itself after Israeli strikes
Updated 4 sec ago
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Iran warns will defend itself after Israeli strikes

Iran warns will defend itself after Israeli strikes
  • And Israel warned Iran would “pay a heavy price” if it responded to the strikes
  • World urge both sides to avoid further escalation, with Russia warning against a "catastrophic scenario”

TEHRAN: Iran warned on Saturday it would defend itself after Israeli air strikes killed at least four soldiers and further stoked fears of a full-scale war in the Middle East.
Israel warned Iran would “pay a heavy price” if it responded to the strikes, and the United States, Germany and Britain demanded Tehran not escalate the conflict further.
US President Joe Biden said he hoped “this is the end” after the pre-dawn Israeli strikes, noting that “it looks like they didn’t hit anything other than military targets.”
Biden had urged Israel to spare nuclear and oil facilities in its retaliatory strikes and the International Atomic Energy Agency confirmed that no nuclear sites were hit.
The European Union called for all parties to exercise utmost restraint to avoid an “uncontrollable escalation.”
Other countries, including many of Iran’s neighbors, condemned Israel’s strikes and some, such as Russia, urged both sides to show restraint and avoid what Moscow dubbed a “catastrophic scenario.”
Iran insisted it had the “right and the duty” to defend itself, while its Lebanese ally Hezbollah said it had already launched rocket salvos targeting five residential areas in northern Israel.
The Israeli army said 80 projectiles were fired across the border on Saturday.
Hezbollah later issued evacuation warnings for more than a dozen named locations in Israel, while the Israeli army made similar warnings for two neighborhoods in southern Beirut.
Lebanon’s official National News Agency reported early Sunday that Israel had carried out a fresh raid in Beirut’s southern suburbs.

Confirming its own strikes after explosions and anti-aircraft fire echoed around Tehran, the Israeli military said it had hit Iranian missile factories and military facilities in several provinces.
The “retaliatory strike has been completed and the mission was fulfilled,” and Israeli aircraft “returned safely,” a military spokesman said.
Iran confirmed Israel had targeted military sites around the capital and in other provinces, saying the raids caused “limited damage” but killed four soldiers.
Iran’s armed forces general staff said only radar systems were damaged in the strikes and held back from any threat of immediate retaliation.
“While reserving its legal and legitimate right to respond at the appropriate moment, Iran is prioritising the establishment of a lasting ceasefire in Gaza and Lebanon,” it said.
Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi held telephone talks with his Egyptian, Qatari and Syrian counterparts.
Qatar’s Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani, a key mediator in Gaza truce efforts, voiced “deep concern over the serious repercussions that may result from this escalation,” his ministry said.

Israel had vowed to retaliate after October 1, when Iran fired around 200 missiles in only the second ever direct attack against its arch-foe. Most of those missiles were intercepted but one person was killed.
The Israeli retaliation drew condemnation from Iraq, Pakistan, Syria and Saudi Arabia, which warned against further escalation. Jordan said Israeli jets had not used its airspace.
Turkiye was one of the most outspoken critics, calling for an end to “terror created by Israel.”
Israel is already engaged in combat on two fronts.
Since last month, it has been fighting a war against Hezbollah in Lebanon, including strikes that have killed the group’s senior leadership and ground incursions seeking to destroy missile sites.
And, for more than a year since Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack, Israel has been fighting a war in Gaza that has caused mass civilian casualties in the densely populated Palestinian territory.
The United Nations has warned the “darkest moment” of that conflict was unfolding, with Palestinians facing a dire humanitarian crisis and daily Israeli bombing.

A defense official said there was “no US involvement” in the strikes on Iran, but afterwards Israeli President Isaac Herzog paid tribute to “our great friend the USA for being a true ally, and for the overt and covert cooperation.” He did not elaborate.
US National Security Council spokesman Sean Savett said Israel’s response was “an exercise in self-defense.”
He urged Iran to “cease its attacks on Israel so that this cycle of fighting can end without further escalation.”
The Israeli military has blamed “Iran and its proxies” in the region for “relentlessly attacking Israel since October 7,” when Hamas attacked Israel, triggering the Gaza war.
That attack resulted in the deaths of 1,206 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.
Dozens of hostages seized on that day are still held by militants in Gaza.
Israel’s retaliatory bombardment and ground war in Gaza has killed 42,924 people, the majority civilians, according to figures from the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry which the United Nations considers reliable.
In late September, Israel turned its focus to Lebanon, hitting Hezbollah targets and leaders and then sending in ground troops.
Israel says the aim is to make the north of its country safe for tens of thousands of displaced civilians to return.
At least 1,615 people have been killed in Lebanon since September 23, according to an AFP tally of Lebanese health ministry figures.
In April, in its first-ever direct assault against Israeli territory, Iran launched more than 300 drones and missiles.
Tehran said the barrage was retaliation for a strike on Iran’s consular annexe in Damascus that killed commanders of its Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
Explosions later in April shook Iran’s Isfahan province in what US officials, cited by American media, said was Israeli retaliation.
Iran said its October 1 missile attack on Israel was retaliation for an Israeli air raid that killed Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah, as well as the assassination in Tehran of Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh.
On Friday, Gaza’s health ministry accused Israeli forces of storming the last functioning hospital in the territory’s north in a raid it said left two children dead.
The Israeli military says it is seeking to destroy operational capabilities Hamas is trying to rebuild in the north.
 


Lebanon state news agency reports Israeli raid on southern Beirut

Lebanon state news agency reports Israeli raid on southern Beirut
Updated 27 October 2024
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Lebanon state news agency reports Israeli raid on southern Beirut

Lebanon state news agency reports Israeli raid on southern Beirut
  • The evacuation call included maps showing buildings that would be targeted in Burj Al-Barajneh and Hadath

BEIRUT, Lebanon: Lebanon’s state news agency on Sunday reported an Israeli raid on southern Beirut, after Israel’s army issued a fresh evacuation call.
The official National News Agency said shortly after midnight that Israel had “targeted the southern suburbs of Beirut.”
The Israeli army had earlier urged residents of two neighborhoods in the southern suburbs of the Lebanese capital to evacuate their homes.
“You are located near Hezbollah facilities and interests, against which the IDF will operate in the near future,” military spokesman Avichay Adraee said in a post on social media platform X, using an acronym for the Israeli army.
The evacuation call included maps showing buildings that would be targeted in Burj Al-Barajneh and Hadath.


The situation in northern Gaza ‘catastrophic’: WHO chief

The situation in northern Gaza ‘catastrophic’: WHO chief
Updated 27 October 2024
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The situation in northern Gaza ‘catastrophic’: WHO chief

The situation in northern Gaza ‘catastrophic’: WHO chief
  • WHO cannot stress loudly enough that hospitals must be shielded from conflict at all times

GENEVA: The World Health Organization chief has warned of a disastrous situation in the north of the war-ravaged Gaza Strip, with “intensive military operations unfolding around and within healthcare facilities.”

“The situation in northern Gaza is catastrophic,” Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on X, warning that “a critical shortage of medical supplies, compounded by severely limited access, are depriving people of life-saving care.”

He pointed in particular to the situation at Kamal Adwan, northern Gaza’s last functioning hospital, which was stormed by Israeli forces on Friday, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.

The ministry charged that the raid on the facility in the Jabalia camp, where Israel launched a significant operation earlier this month, left two children dead.

It accused the Israeli forces of detaining hundreds of staff, patients, and displaced people during the raid.

Tedros said on Saturday that the Gaza Health Ministry had informed WHO, which had temporarily lost contact with its staff at the hospital amid the chaos, that the siege had ended.

“But it came at a heavy cost,” he said.

Late Friday, WHO said three health workers and another employee were injured in the assault and that dozens of health workers were detained at the hospital, where around 600 patients, health workers, and others were sheltering.

“Following the detention of 44 male staff members, only female staff, the hospital director, and one male doctor are left to care for nearly 200 patients in desperate need of medical attention,” Tedros said on Saturday.

“Reports of the hospital facilities and medical supplies being damaged or destroyed during the siege are deplorable,” he said.

Tedros lamented that “the whole health system in Gaza has been under attack for over a year” since Hamas’ Oct. 7 attacks inside Israel last year sparked the war.

Israel’s retaliatory campaign has killed 42,924 people in Gaza, the majority civilians, according to figures from the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry which the United Nations considers reliable.

“WHO cannot stress loudly enough that hospitals must be shielded from conflict at all times,” Tedros said, stressing that “any attack of healthcare facilities is a violation of international humanitarian law”.

“The only path to safeguarding what remains of Gaza’s collapsing health care system is an immediate and unconditional ceasefire.”


Israeli strikes trigger ‘earthquake fears’ in Lebanese border region

Israeli strikes trigger ‘earthquake fears’ in Lebanese border region
Updated 26 October 2024
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Israeli strikes trigger ‘earthquake fears’ in Lebanese border region

Israeli strikes trigger ‘earthquake fears’ in Lebanese border region
  • Hezbollah drone strike targets Israeli airbase, rocket salvo hits intelligence base in Safed
  • UNIFIL confirms it will remain in all its locations, monitoring, submitting reports

BEIRUT: The Israeli army is continuing its aggressive operations, causing devastation in the Lebanese border region.

Israeli booby-traps were found on Saturday while explosions were heard in Odaisseh and Rab Al-Thalathine.

The attacks sent tremors through neighboring towns, causing residents to believe an earthquake had struck.

The sound of explosions could be heard in Marjayoun and Nabatieh.

Activists on social media shared images showing a great strip of explosions, fire, and smoke caused by explosions along the border in the eastern sector.

The extent of the destruction in the border region remains unclear as access to the affected area presents a challenge following Israel’s complete displacement of residents and the prohibition of entry due to military action.

The Israeli army said that “the explosions in the north are a result of our forces’ operations in southern Lebanon,” adding that “there is no fear of a security incident.”

Israeli sources added: “Authorities confirm that there was no earthquake in the Galilee, but rather explosions from the army in southern Lebanon activated the seismic monitoring devices.”

Clashes were continuing as the 13th relief plane operated by the Saudi aid agency KSrelief arrived at Beirut’s Rafic Hariri International Airport on Saturday, carrying essential humanitarian supplies including food and medical aid.

Officials said the initiative reflected “the humanitarian role of Saudi Arabia in supporting the Lebanese people during various crises and hardships.”

A month has passed since the expansion of Israel’s war against Lebanon under the pretext of pushing back the Iran-backed Hezbollah north of the Litani River and returning Israeli settlers to their homes.

The Israeli army claimed that it had “found a tunnel underground and raided houses used as Hezbollah weapon and ammunition depots.”

Political analyst Ali Al-Amin told Arab News: “The Israeli army’s land incursion focuses on Hezbollah’s tunnels, and the nature of the explosions proves so.

“The Israeli army had previously bombed buildings in Mhaibib, and we did not witness such tremors because the operations were above ground.”

He added: “The Israeli incursion depends on its costs. If the cost is high, it will stop. There’s also the time factor.

“It is obvious that the Israeli incursion went beyond Aita Al-Shaab, for instance, and reached other towns across from Aita Al-Shaab.

“It seems as if the Israeli army is imposing an implicit blockade on the towns where the incursion was difficult, so it can return later after it depletes Hezbollah’s power, especially since the militant group’s supplies had been cut off.”

Al-Amin pointed out that “the Israeli army had previously occupied southern Lebanon in the 1970s and 80s without destroying towns and displacing its residents in advance, which means that the Israeli army seeks a fully burned land and a burned border strip in which all of Hezbollah’s infrastructure is destroyed.”

He added: “So far there are no opportunities for an agreement, settlement, or de-escalation.

“I think that the decision-making in Lebanon is largely in the hands of Israel, with certain red lines established by the US, particularly concerning the airport and the capital Beirut.”

Israeli airstrikes in the southern region on Saturday resulted in the deaths of several civilians in the Sidon district.

Five members of the Abouria family, including women and children, were killed in an attack on the town of Tuffahata in the Sidon district.

A paramedic was killed and 12 others injured in an airstrike on a health center in Al-Bazourieh, while two brothers from the Hamada family were killed after their home in the town of Al-Duwair was targeted by an airstrike, and a raid on Al-Shaitiya resulted in the deaths of three people.

Raids also targeted residences in the towns of Kfar Remen, Mayfadoun, Burj Al-Shamali in the Tyre district, Tayr Debba, Ansar, Mount Al-Rayhan Heights, Bissariyeh, Ansar, Bedias, and the city of Nabatieh, where several targets were hit including the Nabatieh Vocational School building where displaced families were taking refuge.

Phosphorus artillery shelling targeted the outskirts of the towns of Halta and Wadi Khansa, and ignited fires in the Majdal Zone and Chamaa, while Yahmar Al-Shaqif was targeted by internationally prohibited cluster bombs.

Up to Friday night in the Baalbek-Hermel region and central Bekaa, the total number of strikes had reached 961 and resulted in the deaths of 427 people and injuries to 988 others.

Hezbollah said on Saturday that it had launched a drone attack on Israel’s Tel Nof Airbase south of Tel Aviv and targeted an intelligence base in northern Safed with rockets.

Its statement said it had targeted “the Kiryat Shmona settlement and an Israeli military gathering in the vicinity of Aita Al-Shaab.”

The group also targeted a military assembly in the Masharifa area in Ras Al-Naqoura and a gathering of soldiers in Shlomi.

Explosions and airstrikes targeting residential areas in the populated towns of the southern region, as well as in the southern suburbs of Beirut and the Bekaa Valley, were accompanied by the release of odors following each bombardment.

Warnings regarding these gasses have been disseminated through social media alerts by individuals who experienced the events.

Israeli airstrikes on Friday targeted Haret Hreik, Burj Al-Barajneh, and the vicinity of Al-Laylaki in the southern suburbs of Beirut and followed an Israeli warning to evacuate buildings.

An Israeli army spokesperson said that “sites (used) for the production of weaponry and the intelligence headquarters of Hezbollah in the southern suburbs of Beirut were targeted.”

Meanwhile, Andrea Tenenti, the spokesperson for the UN Interim Force in Lebanon, confirmed on Saturday that units of the peacekeeping force were remaining in their positions south of the Litani River.

He said that peacekeeping soldiers were continuing their primary mission of monitoring the situation on the ground and reporting on developments, despite facing challenges.

He added: “When we say we are in our locations, we mean every one of these sites.”

UNIFIL on Friday announced that its soldiers had “withdrawn, two days ago, from an observation post in the border town of Dhahira in the western sector to avoid injury after the Israeli army deliberately fired upon it while peacekeeping soldiers were observing Israeli army soldiers carrying out clearing operations in nearby homes.”


Hezbollah urges residents of more than two dozen Israeli ‘settlements’ to evacuate

Hezbollah urges residents of more than two dozen Israeli ‘settlements’ to evacuate
Updated 26 October 2024
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Hezbollah urges residents of more than two dozen Israeli ‘settlements’ to evacuate

Hezbollah urges residents of more than two dozen Israeli ‘settlements’ to evacuate
  • Iran-backed Hezbollah issued its warning in a video

BEIRUT: Lebanon’s Hezbollah warned residents of more than two dozen Israeli “settlements” on Saturday to immediately evacuate, saying they had become legitimate targets because it said Israeli troops were stationed there.

Iran-backed Hezbollah also issued a similar warning to a few communities in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, in a video posted on the Telegram messaging app.