Israel calls for evacuations from south Lebanon as explosions heard in Beirut

Israel’s military urged residents of over 20 towns in south Lebanon to evacuate their homes immediately on Thursday as it pressed on with an invasion after suffering its worst losses in a year of cross-border exchanges of fire with the Hezbollah militia, Reuters has reported. The call for evacuations from southern towns included the provincial capital Nabatieh, suggesting that another Israeli operation designed to further weaken Hezbollah is imminent.

Israel, which has been engaged in a war against the Palestinians in Gaza for almost a year, sent its troops into southern Lebanon after two weeks of intense air strikes, escalating tensions in a conflict that risks drawing in the United States and Iran.

In Beirut’s southern suburbs, a Hezbollah stronghold, three explosions were heard on Thursday and several large plumes of smoke were rising after heavy Israeli strikes. Hezbollah, meanwhile, said that it had detonated an improvised explosive device against Israeli forces infiltrating a southern Lebanese village.

Overnight, Israel bombed central Beirut in an attack that the Lebanese health ministry said killed nine people. Reuters said that witnesses reported hearing a massive blast, which a security source said had targeted a building in the district of Bachoura, a few hundred metres from parliament, the closest an Israeli strike has come to the central downtown district of the Lebanese capital.

“Another sleepless night in Beirut,” said UN special coordinator in Lebanon Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert, on Thursday. “Counting the blasts shaking the city. No warning sirens. Not knowing what’s next. Only that uncertainty lies ahead. Anxiety and fear are omnipresent.”

A Hezbollah-linked civil defence group said that seven of its staff, including two medics, had been killed in the Beirut attack, which Israel claimed was a “precision” air strike. The occupation state also said that it targeted a municipality building in the southern Lebanese town of Bint Jbeil killing 15 Hezbollah members, while more than a dozen Israeli missiles also hit the southern suburb of Dahieh, where Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah was killed last week.

Eight Israeli soldiers were killed in ground fighting on Wednesday in south Lebanon as the occupation forces go deeper into its northern neighbour.

READ: Gaza and a ceasefire slip out of focus as Lebanon conflict rages

As it pushes into south Lebanon, Israel is also weighing up its options for retaliation against Iran. The Islamic Republic launched its largest-ever attack on Israel on Tuesday in what it said was retaliation for Israel’s assassination of senior Hamas and Hezbollah leaders and its offensives in Gaza and Lebanon.

On Thursday, Israel’s military said it had “eliminated” Rawhi Mushtaha, the head of the Hamas government in Gaza, along with senior security officials Sameh Al-Siraj and Sami Oudeh, in strikes three months ago.

According to Tehran, its response is “concluded”, barring further provocation, but Israel and the United States have promised to hit back hard.

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said at an international meeting in Doha that Iran would be ready to respond and warned against “silence” in the face of “warmongering” by Israel. “Any type of military attack, terrorist act or crossing our red lines will be met with a decisive response by our armed forces,” he insisted.

Qatar’s Emir Sheikh Tamim Bin Hamad Al-Thani called at the same meeting for serious ceasefire efforts to stop Israel’s “aggression” in Lebanon, and said that no peace is possible in the Middle East without the creation of a Palestinian state. What is happening in the Middle East is a “collective genocide,” he said, adding that his country has always warned of Israel’s “impunity”.

Iran’s other regional allies — Yemen’s Houthis and armed groups in Iraq — have also launched attacks in the region in solidarity with the Palestinians facing Israel’s genocide in Gaza. The Houthis, who have been firing missiles, sending armed drones and launching boats laden with explosives at commercial ships with ties to Israeli, US and UK entities since last year, said that they had launched a successful drone attack on Israel’s capital Tel Aviv. Israel said that it intercepted a suspicious aerial target in the area of central Israel early on Thursday.

At least 1,900 people have been killed and over 9,000 wounded in Lebanon in almost a year of cross-border fighting, with most of the deaths occurring in the past two weeks, according to Lebanese government statistics. Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati said that about 1.2 million Lebanese had been displaced by the Israeli attacks.

More than 300 of those displaced have taken shelter in a Beirut nightclub, once known for hosting glitzy parties and where staff are now using their guest-list clipboards to register residents. “We’re trying to keep strong,” said Gaelle Irani, who was formerly in charge of guest relations, taking a brief break from finding people a corner to live in. “It’s just overwhelming. So overwhelming and sad. But just as this was a place for people to come enjoy themselves, it’s now a place to shelter people and we are doing everything we can to help and be there for them.”

Hassan Shaaban, a fisherman from Sidon, said that he has been struggling to make a living as the fighting rages. “What can we do, we need to be able to live, we are working while they are striking, last night was very intense,” he pointed out.