Israel has continued its relentless bombardment of Lebanon, striking a residential building in central Beirut and locations in the east and south of the country, killing at least 19 people. Lebanon’s National News Agency (NNA) reported that strikes early on Wednesday killed seven people and wounded five in Tamnin al-Tahta, in the Baalbek district, updating an earlier report that 10 had died.
NNA also reported three people were killed after a car was targeted by an Israeli drone in Saf al-Hawa, Bint Jbeil, southern Lebanon. The Lebanese Ministry of Public Health announced that seven people have been killed and 11 wounded in Israeli attacks on al-Shahabiya, southern Lebanon, overnight. According to the NNA and the ministry, one person was killed in an Israeli drone attack in Nabatieh, southern Lebanon, and one person was killed in Zlaya, Bekaa.
The number of casualties from the central Beirut attack on a multistorey building in the Aisha Bakkar area has not yet been confirmed, but Al Jazeera’s Zeina Khodr reported from the site that the attack appears to be another attempted assassination. She said on Wednesday: “We understand many people who live in this building are now in hospital. We are getting reports there have been deaths and injuries in this strike.” Khodr explained that the building is not a Hezbollah stronghold or in an area where the group has influence, but is located in a densely populated residential area.
Heidi Pett, also reporting for Al Jazeera from central Beirut, said the strike destroyed “one or two floors” of the building instead of levelling it entirely, adding that there was no information yet on who the target was. She stated: “The building is still on fire. There are at least two apartments on fire, one on top of the other, and the damage is really extensive.” Pett noted that Israel carried out this strike without warning.
Pett said: “This is a part of Beirut where people thought that they were going to be safe. Displaced families who fled Dahiyeh [in the southern suburbs after Israeli threats] have been sheltering here, some sleeping in the streets.” The Lebanese government says about 780,000 people have been displaced in the country, a punishing front in the wider regional war which started with the United States and Israel attacking Iran.
Hezbollah said on Wednesday it launched another rocket attack on Israeli military positions south of Khiam in southern Lebanon. The group claims it has repeatedly targeted Israeli military positions in the area in recent days. Israel and Hezbollah have traded heavy fire during the ongoing conflict, but the suffering has been hugely disproportionate. At least 570 people have been killed in Lebanon since Israel renewed widespread attacks on the country last Monday. Two Israeli soldiers have so far been killed in Lebanon, with several people injured in Israel from Hezbollah rockets.
The building hit in Tamnin al-Tahta was inhabited by a Syrian family, the NNA reported. According to NNA, other deadly attacks in the country overnight included some in the southern suburbs of Beirut, a Hezbollah stronghold. Additionally, two Israeli air strikes hit the village of Hanaway, in the Tyre district, killing three civilians, including a paramedic, according to the Ministry of Public Health.
The ministry said an Israeli attack killed one person and wounded eight others in the al-Housh area of Tyre. Two people were also killed in an Israeli attack on the town of Zawtar al-Sharqiyah, the NNA reported. Several people were wounded in an Israeli drone attack on a cafe in al-Housh and on a house in the town of al-Shahabiya, also in Tyre. The ministry said four other people were wounded in an attack on the town of Tibnin, in the Bint Jbeil district.
Meanwhile, on Wednesday, France said it would provide 60 tonnes of humanitarian aid for Lebanon. French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot said in an interview with French radio TF1: “We have decided to triple the volume of aid that will arrive this week. This aid will reach … 60 tons of humanitarian aid for the Lebanese, including sanitation kits, hygiene kits, mattresses, lamps, and also a mobile medical post.”
United Nations spokesperson Stephane Dujarric has called for “immediate de-escalation” in Lebanon, noting that Israeli forced displacement orders have affected hundreds of thousands of people. He told reporters at a media briefing in New York late on Tuesday: “Our humanitarian colleagues report that nearly the entire population of people living in areas south of the Litani River, parts of Baalbek governorate and the Bekaa Valley, and large sections of Beirut’s southern suburbs are now caught up in hostilities.”
Source: www.aljazeera.com