Middle East latest: Airlines cancel flights as Hezbollah hits back after Israeli jets target Lebanon

By Alex Rossi, international correspondent

Another dangerous moment appears to be passing in this disastrous conflict but great peril remains for Israel, Lebanon and the wider region.

Israel’s preemptive strike and Hezbollah’s retaliatory attack for the assassination of their top commander in late July risked plunging both sides into all-out war.

That nightmare scenario appears to be fading for now, but all of the dynamics for a much bigger conflict remain.

Effectively the stand-off – with each side sending messages with bombs and rockets – continues.

The Israelis and Hezbollah are signalling that they do not seek a wider war but the risk of accident and miscalculation remains.

Both sides are also under pressure to do more, which could also lead to a dangerous spiral.

There are people behind Hezbollah’s leader Hassan Nasrallah who are urging a more forceful response to Israel’s continued assault on Gaza.

And Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has very loud voices in his ear telling him to launch a major operation against the Lebanese militant group to force it back from the border and allow tens of thousands of Israelis to return home.

The problem is that violence often ends up having its own logic and can take actors in directions they may not foresee.

It may not be in Israel or Hezbollah’s interest to fight a major war, but it may happen anyway.

And the consequences would be disastrous, with significant damage and casualties on both sides.

The key to dialling down the tensions would be a ceasefire in Gaza, but for the moment that seems to be out of reach, meaning great danger lies ahead.

Polio vaccines for more than a million people have been delivered to Gaza, Israel’s military has said.

Five lorries with special refrigeration equipment for vaccine storage were brought into Gaza on Friday and the jabs arrived on Sunday, a statement by the Israeli military body responsible for Palestinian civilian affairs said.

It said vaccinations will be conducted by international and local medical teams at “various locations”, in coordination with Israel’s military as part of “routine humanitarian pauses” to allow people to reach health centres.

It comes after the first confirmed case of the disease in the territory in a quarter of a century, with other cases suspected after the virus was detected in wastewater in six different locations in July.

Aid groups have plans to vaccinate more than 600,000 children under 10 and have called for an urgent pause in fighting. The UN has aimed to bring 1.6 million doses of polio vaccine into Gaza.

What is polio?

Polio is a highly contagious infection that is transmitted mainly through contact with contaminated waste, water, or food. 

It can cause difficulty breathing and irreversible paralysis, usually in the legs. It strikes young children in particular and can sometimes be fatal.

Hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians live in crowded tent camps, where they lack clean water or proper disposal for sewage and rubbish – with families sometimes using wastewater to drink or clean dishes.

Israel and Hezbollah traded their most intense fire for months in the early hours of Sunday before pulling back hours later, with both sides saying they wanted to avoid further escalation.

Hezbollah claimed to hit an Israeli military intelligence site near Tel Aviv in a barrage of hundreds of rockets and drones. 

Israel claimed its attacks in southern Lebanon had been pre-emptive to avert a larger assault by Hezbollah. 

Our military analyst Sean Bell explains more:

Iran’s planned retaliation for the assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran will be “definitive,” the country’s foreign minister has warned.

Abbas Araghchi said he made the remark during a phone call with Italy’s foreign minister Antonio Tajani.

“Iran reaction to Israeli terrorist attack in Tehran is definitive, and will be measured & well calculated,” Mr Araghchi tweeted.

“We do not fear escalation, yet do not seek it – unlike Israel.”

In a statement, Mr Tajani said he “called for restraint and to pursue a constructive approach, in order to stop the cycle of military actions in the region, which only risks bringing more suffering.

“It is important that Iran exercises moderation towards Hezbollah in order to avert an escalation on the Lebanese-Israeli border, where Italian soldiers of the UNIFIL contingent are operating, and towards the Houthis in order to avoid an increase in tensions in the Red Sea area, where Italy plays a leading role in the [European Union’s] Aspides mission.”

The pair made the call after Israel and Iran-backed Lebanese militant group Hezbollah traded heavy fire early on Sunday – before backing off from igniting an all-out war in the Middle East.

Israel and Hezbollah have reportedly exchanged messages via intermediaries aimed at preventing further escalation after both sides traded heavy fire on Sunday.

The development comes hours after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned “this is not the end of the verse” after Israel launched “pre-emptive strikes” against Hezbollah in Lebanon in the early hours of Sunday.

The Israel Defence Forces (IDF) said nearly all the targets it struck were short-range rockets aimed at northern Israel.

Hezbollah, an Iran-backed militant group, said it fired drones and hundreds of rockets at Israel on Sunday morning in response to the killing of one of its top commanders in the Lebanese capital Beirut last month.

The group said it had hit an Israeli military intelligence site near Tel Aviv as part of the barrage.

Welcome back to our live coverage of the situation in the Middle East.

Yesterday Israel said it launched a series of pre-emptive strikes at southern Lebanon to prevent a large-scale rocket and drone attack by the Hezbollah militant group.

The escalation in hostilities between the two sides had cooled by mid-morning, with no signs of a widely feared all-out war in the region.

However, Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah said the group reserved the right “to respond at a later time” if the results of yesterday’s attack “weren’t sufficient”.

Three deaths were confirmed in Lebanon and one in Israel, where damage appeared to be limited.

Senior figures in the US and across Europe called for a de-escalation of tensions to avoid a full-scale regional war in response to the strikes.

Meanwhile, talks in Cairo on a possible Gaza ceasefire ended with no agreement yesterday, as Israel and Hamas failed to agree on mediator-proposed compromises.

The talks are expected to continue, US officials have said.

We’re ending our live coverage of the strikes launched by Israel and Hezbollah and the wider situation in the Middle East for this evening.

We’ll be back overnight with any major updates.

Before we go, here’s a reminder of the day’s main developments…

Israel-Lebanon tensions

• Israel said it launched a wave of “pre-emptive” airstrikes against Hezbollah in southern Lebanon overnight – as the militant group said it had fired drones and hundreds of rockets;
• Hezbollah said its attack was an initial response to the killing of one of its founders and top commanders in an Israeli airstrike in Beirut last month;
• At least three people were killed in the strikes in Lebanon, according to reports, while the IDF said there was “very little damage” in Israel;

• Israel and Hezbollah both said they wanted to avoid any escalation into a full-scale war – but Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned the strikes were “not the end of the story”;
• Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah said the response to the killing of one of its commanders was delayed for several reasons, including to give ceasefire talks a chance. He also claimed the attack was carried out “as planned” and that the group had targeted an Israeli military base near Tel Aviv.

Catch up on the latest analysis on the Israel-Lebanon tensions from our international correspondents:

• Dominic Waghorn, international affairs editor: Israel will say it had no choice, but airstrikes risk igniting regional war
• Alistair Bunkall, Middle East correspondent: Dust has settled after attacks sparked fear of full-scale war – but there’s a caveat
• Alex Rossi: Difficult to know where this conflict goes next

Israel-Hamas war

• Elsewhere, high-level Gaza ceasefire talks in Cairo ended today with no agreement between Israel and Hamas. A Hamas official said earlier that it was rejecting new Israeli conditions. Its delegation left the Egyptian capital this evening;
• Israeli ambassador to the UK Tzipi Hotovely told Sky News Hamas could end the war “today” if it released its remaining hostages;
• Hamas’s armed wing said earlier tonight that it had fired a rocket towards Tel Aviv in Israel. The IDF said a missile had landed in an open area of central Israel.

Antonio Guterres, the secretary-general of the UN, has said he is “deeply concerned” by the escalation in exchanges of fire across the Lebanon-Israel border.

He said the attacks put civilians on both sides at risk and “threaten regional security and stability”.

“I call for immediate de-escalation and appeal to the parties to return to a cessation of hostilities,” he said in a post to X.

There’s been no major US reaction to the situation between Israel and Hezbollah today as officials are “waiting to see what happens next”, says our US correspondent Mark Stone.

After a day consisting of “just short statements” from politicians in America and across Europe, there are “one of two things” that could happen next, Stone says.

One option, he says, is that a deal is reached on a ceasefire in Gaza, “which would then allow Hezbollah to say ‘we’re going to stop attacking Israel from the north’”.

But with that looking “unlikely” after Israel and Hamas failed once again to come to an agreement following several days of high-level talks in Cairo, Stone says exchanges of fire across the border will continue and could lead to a potential “miscalculation, a large loss of life on one side or the other, and then the whole thing spirals”. 

“There’s an unbelievably uncomfortable game of brinkmanship that continues here,” Stone adds. 

He notes that US officials speaking on the sidelines of the Cairo talks have said Gaza ceasefire discussions are ongoing.

Talks in Cairo aimed at negotiating a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas in Gaza have ended with no agreement, the Reuters news agency reports, citing two Egyptian sources.

The sources reportedly said that neither the militant group nor Israel agreed to several compromises suggested by mediators.

As we’ve been reporting this evening, Hamas said it has rejected new Israeli ceasefire conditions which it claims deviated from a US proposal put forward in July (more detail in 21.10 post).

A reporter for the US outlet Axios has separately cited a US official as saying talks in recent days had been “constructive” and would “continue over the coming days” in order to “address remaining issues and details”.