DM Monitoring
Beirut: Lebanon’s health ministry said Friday Israeli strikes killed seven people including a child in different parts of the south, with Hezbollah saying three of its fighters were among the dead.
Hezbollah, which is backed by Iran, has exchanged regular fire with Israel in support of its ally Hamas since the Palestinian militant group’s October 7 attack on Israel sparked the Gaza war.
The health ministry said an “Israeli enemy drone strike” killed two people including a “seven-year-old” in Aita al-Shaab, and two other “Israeli” strikes killed five people in three other locations in the south.
Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency said a “hostile drone” targeted a house in Aita al-Shaab with “two guided missiles”.
The health ministry said Israeli strikes included a raid “on the village of Tayr Harfa that killed three people”, with Hezbollah later mourning three fighters killed by Israeli fire, including a man from that same village.
A source close to the group, requesting anonymity, told media that the three fighters were killed in the Tayr Harfa strike.
Israel’s military said its aircraft “eliminated” members of “a terrorist cell that was planning to fire projectiles from the area of Tayr Harfa”.
On Friday morning, Hezbollah said it had targeted the northern Israel base of Meron “in response to the enemy’s attacks on… southern villages and homes”. The threat of full-blown war grew after Iran and Hezbollah vowed to avenge the killings last month, blamed on Israel, of Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran and top Hezbollah commander Fuad Shukr in south Beirut.
Cross-border violence since the Gaza war started has killed 600 people in Lebanon, mostly Hezbollah fighters but including at least 131 civilians, according to an AFP tally. The Israeli authorities have announced the deaths of at least 23 soldiers and 26 civilians since the escalation began.
Earlier, Retired Israeli Major General Yitzhak Brik warned on Thursday that Israel could face “collapse within a year” if its current war against Palestinian group Hamas and Lebanese movement Hezbollah continues.
“The country really is galloping towards the edge of an abyss,” Brik said in an opinion piece published by Israeli daily Haaretz.
“If the war of attrition against Hamas and Hezbollah continues, Israel will collapse within no more than a year.”
The Israeli army has launched a brutal offensive on the Gaza Strip since an October 7 Hamas attack, killing nearly 40,300 people, mostly women and children, and injuring over 93,100 others.
The onslaught has triggered months of cross-border attacks between Hezbollah and Israel amid fears of a full-blown war between the two sides. Brik cast doubts on claims of Israeli officials about Hamas surrender and that its leader Yahya Sinwar would be caught.
“Most of the pretentious declarations made by Defense Minister Yoav Gallant throughout the war in Gaza have proven to be groundless,” he said.
“With these pronouncements, Gallant, along with his colleagues IDF Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, has been throwing dust in the eyes of the Israeli public,” he add-ed.
The retired general said that Gallant has begun to realize that “the concept of total victory in Gaza is nonsense.”
“It seems that he has begun to realize that failing to reach a hostage deal with Hamas would lead to a regional war that would put Israel in serious danger,” Brik said.
As for a potential hostage swap deal with Hamas, he said it has “become impossible” to achieve what Israel could have gained earlier with a cease-fire deal “due to the new conditions that Netanyahu in-troduced into the proposed deal.”
For months, the US, Qatar and Egypt have been trying to reach an agreement between Israel and Ha-mas to ensure a prisoner exchange and cease-fire and allow humanitarian aid to enter Gaza. But medi-ation efforts have been stalled due to Netanyahu’s refusal to meet Hamas’s demands to stop the war.
Israel has continued its brutal offensive on the Gaza Strip following an attack by Hamas last Oct. 7, de-spite a UN Security Council resolution calling for an immediate cease-fire.
An Israeli blockade of Gaza has led to severe shortages of food, clean water and medicine, leaving much of the region in ruins.
