BEIRUT: Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah survived after Israel’s military launched intense strikes on the southern suburbs of Lebanon’s capital Beirut on Friday, shortly after the country’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s outrageous speech at the U.N. General Assembly.
According to an Anadolu Agency (AA) correspondent on the ground, Israeli warplanes launched some 10 airstrikes on the area, which is a Hezbollah stronghold, with a large smoke plume rising over the area.
Shortly after the airstrikes, Israeli army spokesman Daniel Hagari said the attack targeted Hezbollah’s main headquarters, which he claimed was built underneath civilian buildings.
The massive explosion was so powerful it rattled windows and shook houses some 30 kilometers north of Beirut. Ambulances were seen heading to the scene of the explosions, sirens wailing.
The strike came an hour after thousands of people attended the funeral of a top Hezbollah commander who was killed the day before.
Lebanon’s official news agency NNA reported extensive damage in the Harat Hreik area of southern Beirut, with several buildings collapsing and thick clouds of smoke rising from the area.
In response to the attack, the Lebanese Red Cross announced on X that they had deployed 10 teams to the scene.
Channel 12 also reported that Israel informed the US of the imminent strike just minutes before its execution.
Newspaper Israel Hayom reported that the country was now on high alert, anticipating potential heavy rocket fire from Lebanon following the bombardment.
According to Yedioth Ahronoth, another Israeli daily, the country’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu abruptly left a press conference at the UN headquarters in New York on Friday.
The departure followed a briefing from his military secretary about the airstrikes in Beirut, according to the newspaper.
For his part, Lebanese Premier Najib Mikati said information indicated “a large number of victims” in the attack.
Earlier in the day, an Israeli airstrike killed a family of nine in a Lebanese border village, authorities said, as Lebanon struggled to deal with a rising death toll, a wave of tens of thousands fleeing their homes and the possibility of an all-out war between Israel and Hezbollah.
As the two sides continued to trade fire, Netanyahu, who’s accused of war crimes in Gaza, addressed world leaders at the U.N., vowing “continue degrading Hezbollah” until Israel achieves its goals along the Lebanon border, further dimming hopes for an internationally backed cease-fire.
Israel dramatically intensified its airstrikes in Lebanon this week, saying it is determined to put an end to more than 11 months of Hezbollah fire into its territory. The scope of Israel’s attacks remains unclear, but officials have said a ground invasion to push the group away from the border is a possibility. Israel has moved thousands of troops toward the border in preparation.
That has Lebanese fearing a repeat of the last Israel-Hezbollah war, in 2006, which lasted a month and wreaked heavy destruction over parts of their country. Or worse, they fear, Lebanon could suffer devastation on the scale wreaked in Gaza by Israel’s nearly year-long aggression, which has led to an investigation by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) for amounting to war crimes.
At least 25 people were killed in Israeli strikes early Friday, Health Minister Firass Abiad said, bringing the death toll in Lebanon this week to more than 720. He said the dead included dozens of women and children.
