Israel’s strikes across southern Lebanon show the Hezbollah truce is fraying in practice, even as both sides continue operating inside its formal boundaries.
The escalation came Thursday after Israel said it killed the commander of Hezbollah’s elite Radwan Force in a Wednesday strike on Beirut’s southern suburbs, the first Israeli strike on the area since the ceasefire began in April. Reuters also reported the strike targeted a commander of Hezbollah’s elite Radwan force and described it as the first Beirut strike since the ceasefire.
AFP photographs from the southern suburbs showed the top floors of a residential building destroyed, with rescuers searching through rubble Thursday morning.
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Hezbollah had not retaliated for the Beirut attack, despite the strike landing near the capital and shocking Lebanon after weeks of fighting were supposed to have ended.
Lebanese state media reported Israeli strikes across several southern towns and villages Thursday, while the Israeli army issued new evacuation warnings for three villages north of the Litani River.
Some of the strikes hit Nabatieh, where a shopping centre and residential buildings were targeted, according to state media and an AFP correspondent. In nearby Toul, two rescuers from the Hezbollah-affiliated Islamic Health Committee were wounded when an Israeli strike hit as they were dispatched after an earlier attack, spokesperson Mahmoud Karaki told AFP.
Karaki said the team’s ambulance was heavily damaged, underscoring how the southern strikes extended beyond military positions and into rescue operations, commercial areas, and residential zones.
The Israeli military said Thursday that an “explosive drone impact” wounded four soldiers in southern Lebanon the previous day, including one severely. Despite the ceasefire, Hezbollah has regularly claimed attacks against Israeli forces occupying parts of southern Lebanon.
The casualty count remains heavily asymmetric. Since the war began on March 2, Israeli strikes have killed more than 2,700 people in Lebanon. The Israeli military says it has lost 17 soldiers and a contractor in south Lebanon.
The numbers also expose the truce’s core contradiction. The ceasefire was meant to end weeks of fighting, but combat has largely continued in the south, while the Beirut strike widened the pressure beyond the border area.
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