The drone strike killed two people on the busy Beirut-Damascus highway in Aley [Houssam Shbaro/Anadolu via Getty Images]
More Lebanese soldiers have been killed in an Israeli strike in south Lebanon as an international conference kicked off to discuss ways to support the country’s military in a post-war scenario.
The Lebanese army said in a statement that three soldiers, including an officer, were evacuating wounded persons on the outskirts of the village of Yater in the Bint Jbeil district when they were struck and killed.
A video of the officer, Maj. Mohammad Farhat, went viral on social media where he was seen last year confronting Israeli soldiers at the border as they tried to set up a barbed wire fence.
The Lebanese army is not involved in the current war between Israel and Hezbollah, but a number of its personnel have been killed in strikes in southern Lebanon. Another three soldiers were killed last week as they were in their vehicles.
Installations belonging to the UN peacekeeping force in south Lebanon, UNIFIL, have also been targeted by Israel, and a number of their soldiers wounded.
Meanwhile, an international conference for Lebanon was being held in Paris on Thursday, as states, including host country France, had vowed to support the Lebanese people and the military.
A potential ceasefire deal between Hezbollah and Israel could see thousands of additional Lebanese troops deployed in the south alongside UNIFIL in line with 2006 UN Security Council Resolution 1701.
Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati, attending the Paris summit, said on Thursday that Beirut was ready to recruit an additional 1,500 troops to be deployed in south Lebanon as part of the first phase of implementing UNSCR 1701. He said 8,000 troops in total were necessary to reach long-term stability.
The US is trying to mediate a deal between Beirut and Tel Aviv that would see UNSCR 1701, or an amended version of it, properly implemented. It calls for the disarmament of all groups outside state control, including Hezbollah, and the withdrawal of Hezbollah’s fighters from south of the Litani River.
But Israel has vowed to continue hitting Hezbollah, battered in a wave of huge operations since 17 September that has seen thousands of its members killed or wounded in pager and walkie-talkie attacks, and its senior command structure eliminated.
Car struck in Aley
A vehicle was targeted in a drone strike on a main highway Thursday morning.
The attack happened in Dahr al-Wahesh just a few hundred meters away from the Mount Lebanon city of Aley. Videos showed bloodied people on the floor, and some being moved away from the scene of the strike, as a car was up in flames.
The Lebanese Red Cross told local media that two people were killed in the attack.
The international road is one of Lebanon’s busiest and links Beirut to Damascus in Syria. It was not immediately clear who was targeted in the strike.
While Israel’s attacks have been concentrated in south Lebanon, the eastern Beqaa region, and Beirut’s southern suburbs, some deadly strikes have happened elsewhere.
A drone strike last month damaged a car in the town of Kahaleh, very close to the site of Thursday’s attack, leaving one man with serious injuries. Another drone attack in the coastal city of Jounieh last week targeted a car on a busy highway and killed two people.
Israel’s countless strikes on busy civilian areas have been slammed as potential war crimes.
Another Israeli strike on Thursday was reported in the highlands of the Jbeil district in the Mount Lebanon governorate.
A missile reportedly landed in a forest area around the village of Almat, causing no injuries but resulting in a fire.
Beirut’s Laylaki pounded
Wednesday night saw heavy Israeli strikes on the southern suburbs of Beirut, which have been carpet-bombed on a near-nightly basis since last month.
At least six buildings were reportedly levelled in the attack on Laylaki, a residential neighbourhood close to the country’s only civilian airport.
Scenes of the massive strike and huge ball of flames went viral on social media. It’s not clear if anybody was killed or injured, but most of the area’s residents have already evacuated.
Dozens of Hezbollah’s senior commanders have been killed in Beirut’s southern suburbs – locally known as ‘Dahiyeh’ – including the group’s leader Hassan Nasrallah and his potential successor Hashem Safieddine.
Earlier Wednesday Israel carried out at least seven strikes on south Lebanon’s Tyre, an ancient port city home to Phoenician and Roman ruins.
The Israeli military ordered the evacuation of a residential quarter in the heart of the city, giving residents who hadn’t already left little time to evacuate.
Seven buildings were reportedly destroyed, and widespread damage could be seen in neighbouring streets. No deaths were reported.
’70 Israeli soldiers killed’
Hezbollah claimed that it has so far killed 70 Israeli soldiers in clashes in southern Lebanon.
Israel announced on 1 October that it was carrying out “limited ground operations” inside Lebanese territory, claiming that it wants to dismantle Hezbollah infrastructure. It has since been engaged in battle with the Shia group’s fighters. Heavy clashes have concentrated around the villages of Ayta al-Shaab, Ramyah and Qouzah for days.
Hezbollah didn’t give a time frame for when the 70 troops were killed but has often said that Israel is dishonest about its casualty numbers. The Israeli military says only 20 soldiers have died in the ground battles.
“The enemy’s army was not able to occupy any of the villages on the frontline in southern Lebanon, and we are confronting the occupation forces on five axes of the border,” Hezbollah said in a statement Wednesday evening, adding that it wounded another 600 officers and soldiers.
“We destroyed 28 Merkava tanks, four military bulldozers, an armoured vehicle, and a troop carrier, and shot down three Hermes 450 [drones] and another Hermes 900 [drone],” the statement said.
It added that the Israeli army booby-trapped some homes and blew them up “after it failed to occupy the town or hold its ground.”
Several border villages including Mhaibib, Mays al-Jabal, Blida, Kfar Kela and Ayta al-Shaab have seen massive-scale destruction or completely been wiped out, in what some analysts believe is Israel’s attempts to create a buffer zone in post-war south Lebanon.
Satellite images shared by visual investigations journalist Christiaan Triebart this week show nearly 300 buildings completely flattened by the Israeli military across three border villages. This is “a very conservative estimate,” says the New York Times journalist.
