Updated

Nov 16, 2024, 11:17 PM

Published

Nov 16, 2024, 10:20 PM

BEIRUT – Israel launched a wave of air strikes on Hezbollah bastions in Beirut and south Lebanon on Nov 16, a day after Lebanese government officials said they were studying a US truce proposal.

An Israeli strike on neighbouring Syria earlier this week killed two leaders from Islamic Jihad, a Palestinian group which has fought alongside Hamas militants in Gaza, a source told AFP.

Hamas, Hezbollah and Islamic Jihad are all backed by Israel’s arch-enemy Iran, which on Nov 15 said it backed a swift end to the nearly two-month war in Lebanon.

Since Sept 23, Israel has escalated its bombing of targets in Lebanon, later sending in ground troops after almost a year of limited, cross-border exchanges of fire begun by Hezbollah militants over the Gaza war.

AFPTV footage showed fresh strikes on the southern suburbs of Beirut on Nov 16, following calls from the Israeli army for residents to evacuate.

Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency (NNA) said “the enemy” carried out three air raids in the morning, later reporting another attack in the neighbourhood of Chiyah.

The Israeli military said its aircraft had targeted “a weapons storage facility” and a Hezbollah “command centre” in south Beirut.

NNA also reported a strike on the southern city of Tyre, in a neighbourhood near Unesco-listed ancient ruins.

Elsewhere in south Lebanon, the health ministry said Israeli strikes killed two rescuers affiliated with Hezbollah and its ally Amal.

Hezbollah claimed several rocket attacks on northern Israel, targeting military sites including a naval base in the Haifa area.

The Lebanese authorities say that more than 3,440 people have been killed since October 2023, when Hezbollah and Israel began trading fire.

‘Massive explosion’

In Hamas-run Gaza, the Israeli military said its forces continued “operational activity” in the northern areas of Jabalia and Beit Lahia, the targets of an intense offensive since early October.

Troops also operated in the southern district of Rafah, the army said.

Israel says its renewed operations in the ravaged north were meant to stop Hamas militants from regrouping.

A UN-backed assessment at the weekend warned that famine was imminent in northern Gaza, and UN figures showed the Israeli operation had forced at least 100,000 people to flee.

Israel has pushed back against a Human Rights Watch report this week that said its displacement of Gazans amounts to a “crime against humanity”, as well as findings from a UN Special Committee that pointed to warfare practices that “are consistent with the characteristics of genocide”.

A foreign ministry spokesman dismissed the HRW report as “completely false”, while the United States – Israel’s main military backer – said accusations of genocide “are certainly unfounded”.

The Gaza health ministry said at least 35 people were killed in the territory in the previous 24 hours, taking the overall death toll in more than 13 months of war to 43,799.

The majority of the dead were civilians, according to ministry figures which the UN considers reliable.

Hamas’ Oct 7, 2023 attack on Israel that sparked the war resulted in the deaths of 1,206 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.

The civil defence agency reported 11 people killed in strikes across Gaza early on Nov 16.

In Rafah, Mr Jamil al-Masry said a house was hit, causing “a massive explosion”.

“We went to the house, only to find it in ruins, with fire raging and smoke and dust everywhere,” he told AFP.

People “started searching for martyrs and survivors” with their bare hands, he said, with some “still under the rubble”.

Iranian support

In a rare claim of responsibility for a strike on Syria, Israel said it targeted the Islamic Jihad group on Nov 14.

A source from the group told AFP on Nov 16 that Abdel Aziz Minawi, a member of Islamic Jihad’s political bureau, and the group’s foreign relations chief Rasmi Abu Issa were killed in the strike on Qudsaya, in the Damascus area.

Islamic Jihad still holds several Israeli hostages taken during the Oct 7, 2023 attack on southern Israel. Earlier this week, the group released two video clips of Ms Sasha Trupanov, a 29-year-old Russian-Israeli hostage.

As diplomacy aimed at ending the Gaza war has stalled, a top government official in Beirut said on Nov 15 that US Ambassador Lisa Johnson had presented a 13-point proposal to halt the Israel-Hezbollah conflict.

It includes a 60-day truce, during which Lebanon will deploy troops to the border. The official said Israel has yet to respond to the plan.

A second Lebanese official, similarly requesting anonymity to discuss sensitive matters, said he was “optimistic” about the talks.

A senior adviser to Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei met Lebanese officials in Beirut on Nov 15, saying Tehran was “looking for solutions”.

The supreme leader’s special envoy Ali Larijani said Iran supported the Lebanese government and “the resistance” – Hezbollah – “under any circumstances”. AFP