Page 9 - Lebanon

EU asks Israel for ceasefire with Hezbollah as 'all concerns addressed'

The European Union's top diplomat said Tuesday there were no excuses for Israel to refuse to implement a ceasefire with the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, saying all its security concerns had been addressed in the US-French-brokered deal. Josep Borrell, the outgoing EU foreign policy chief, called for increased pressure on Israel to blunt extremists in the government who are refusing to accept the deal. Speaking on the sidelines of a Group of Seven meeting in Italy, Borrell warned that if a ceasefire is not implemented, Lebanon will fall apart. Israeli officials said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's security Cabinet was set to convene Tuesday to discuss a proposed ceasefire. Among the issues that remain is an Israeli demand to reserve the right to act should Hezbollah violate its obligations under the emerging deal. Borrell said the US would chair a ceasefire implementation committee, but France would participate at the request of Lebanon. On the proposal agreement brokered

What's blocking ceasefire between Israel, Hezbollah: All you need to know

Diplomats and other officials say there have been several sticking points in ceasefire talks to end the war between Israel and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, even as conditions for an agreement appear to be ripe. Israel's military has killed nearly all of the militant group's top leaders, but it continues to fire missiles into Israel. Tens of thousands of Israelis who were evacuated from the border months ago are pressuring their government to help them go home. And the world wants to stop regional conflict from spreading after more than a year of fighting. Following the latest visit to the region by a US mediator, Israel hit central Beirut over the weekend, and Hezbollah responded with its biggest barrage in weeks as each applied pressure to reach a deal. Israel and Hezbollah have exchanged fire almost daily since the day after Hamas-led militants attacked Israel on October 7, 2023, setting off the war in Gaza. Israel launched a widespread bombardment of Lebanon two months

Israel strikes Lebanon as leaders draw closer to ceasefire with Hezbollah

Israel's military launched airstrikes across Lebanon on Monday, unleashing explosions throughout the country and killing at least 12 while Israeli leaders appeared to be closing in on a negotiated ceasefire with the Hezbollah militant group. Israeli strikes hit commercial and residential buildings in Beirut as well as in the port city of Tyre. Military officials said they targeted areas known as Hezbollah strongholds. They issued evacuation orders for Beirut's southern suburbs, and strikes landed across the city, including metres from a Lebanese police base and the city's largest public park. The barrage came as officials indicated they were nearing agreement on a ceasefire, while Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Security Cabinet prepared to discuss an offer on the table. Airstrikes kill at least 12 Massive explosions lit up Lebanon's skies with flashes of orange, sending towering plumes of smoke into the air as Israeli airstrikes pounded Beirut's southern suburbs ...

Israeli strikes kill dozens across Lebanon, 29 dead in Beirut attack

The Beirut airstrike is just one of several across the country as Israel continues its aggressive military campaign against Hezbollah

Hezbollah fires over 250 rockets into Israel, wounding at least 7

Hezbollah fired at least 185 rockets and other projectiles into Israel on Sunday, wounding seven people in the militant group's heaviest barrage in several days, in response to deadly Israeli strikes in Beirut while negotiators pressed on with cease-fire efforts to halt the all-out war. Meanwhile, an Israeli strike on a Lebanese army centre killed one soldier and wounded 18 others on the southwestern coastal road between Tyre and Naqoura, Lebanon's military said. Israel's military expressed regret and said the strike occurred in an area of combat against Hezbollah, adding that its operations are directed solely against the militants. The strike was under review. Israeli strikes have killed over 40 Lebanese troops since the start of the war between Israel and Hezbollah, even as Lebanon's military has largely kept to the sidelines. Lebanon's caretaker prime minister, Najib Mikati, condemned the latest strike as an assault on US-led cease-fire efforts, calling it a direct, bloody messa

Israel strikes central Beirut, 20 killed as diplomats push for ceasefire

Israeli airstrikes Saturday in central Beirut killed at least 20 people, officials said, as the once-rare attacks on the heart of Lebanon's capital continued without warning while diplomats scrambled to broker a cease-fire. Lebanon's Health Ministry said 66 people were wounded in the strikes, which were the fourth in central Beirut in less than a week. The escalation comes after US envoy Amos Hochstein travelled to the region in pursuit of a deal to end months of fighting between Israel and Hezbollah that has erupted into full-on war. Israeli attacks have killed more than 3,500 people in Lebanon, according to Lebanon's Health Ministry. The fighting has displaced about 1.2 million people, or a quarter of Lebanon's population. On the Israeli side, about 90 soldiers and nearly 50 civilians have been killed by bombardment in northern Israel and the fighting. An eight-storey building is turned to rubble The 4 am strikes destroyed an eight-storey building in central Beirut. Hezbollah ..

Airstrikes hit central Beirut's Basta, destroying at least one building

A series of Israeli airstrikes hit central Beirut's Basta neighbourhood early Saturday, destroying at least one building and leaving a crater in the ground. Lebanon's state-run National News Agency said Israeli war planes completely destroyed an eight-story residential building with five missiles. It was not immediately clear how many people were injured or killed, but ambulances rushed to the scene. The Israeli military did not issue a warning for residents to evacuate prior to the strike and did not immediately issue a statement on it. The strikes, which occurred around 4 am local time, came after a day of heavy bombardment of Beirut's southern suburbs and the southern coastal city of Tyre. The Israeli military had issued evacuation notices prior to those strikes. Heavy ground fighting between Israeli forces and Hezbollah militants was ongoing in southern Lebanon as Israeli troops have pushed farther from the border. The escalation comes after US envoy Amos Hochstein travelled t

UN reports heavy clashes between Israeli troops, Hezbollah in south Lebanon

Israeli troops fought fierce battles with Hezbollah fighters on Friday in different areas in south Lebanon, including a coastal town that is home to the headquarters of UN peacekeepers. A spokesman for the UN peacekeeping force known as UNIFIL told The Associated Press that they are monitoring heavy clashes in the coastal town of Naqoura and the village of Chamaa to the northeast. UNIFIL's headquarters are located in Naqoura in Lebanon's southern edge close to the border with Israel. We are aware of heavy shelling in the vicinity of our bases, UNIFIL spokesman Andrea Tenenti said. Asked if the peacekeepers and staff at the headquarters are safe, Tenenti said: Yes for the moment. Several UNIFIL posts have been hit since Israel began its ground invasion of Lebanon on October 1, leaving a number of peacekeepers wounded. The fighting came a day after the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, his former defence minister and a

Israel insists on right to act against Hezbollah in any deal to end fight

Israel's defence minister says his country insists on the right to act militarily against Hezbollah in any agreement to end the fighting in Lebanon. Lebanon's government is likely to view any such demand as an infringement on its sovereignty, complicating efforts to end more than a year of fighting between Israel and Hezbollah that erupted into all-out war in September. Defense Minister Israel Katz said in a statement Wednesday that the condition for any political settlement in Lebanon is the preservation of the intelligence capability and the preservation of the (Israeli military's) right to act and protect the citizens of Israel from Hezbollah. Lebanese officials mediating between Israel and Hezbollah have called for a return to United Nations Security Council Resolution 1701, which ended the 2006 war between the sides. It calls for Hezbollah militants and Israeli forces to withdraw from a buffer zone in southern Lebanon patrolled by U.N. peacekeepers and Lebanese troops. U.S. e

Israeli strike kills 5 as Lebanon, Hezbollah accept US ceasefire proposal

World powers say a ceasefire must be based on U.N. Security Council Resolution 1701 which ended a 2006 war between Israel and Hezbollah. Its terms require Hezbollah to move weapons and fighters north

At least 11 killed, 48 injured in Israeli strikes on Lebanon's Tyr region

The strikes in the Tyr region come weeks after Israel had conducted earlier military operations in the area

Israeli strike in Beirut kills Hezbollah spokesman, strike in Gaza kills 30

A rare Israeli airstrike on central Beirut killed Hezbollah's chief spokesman on Sunday, an official with the militant group said. Earlier, officials said Israeli strikes killed at least 12 people in the Gaza Strip, where Israel has been at war with the Palestinian Hamas for over a year. The latest in targeted killings of senior Hezbollah officials came as Lebanese officials considered a United States-led cease-fire proposal. Israel also bombed several buildings in Beirut's southern suburbs, where Hezbollah has long been headquartered, after warning people to evacuate. Mohammed Afif, the head of media relations for Hezbollah, was killed in a strike on the Arab socialist Baath party's office in central Beirut, according to a Hezbollah official who was not authorized to brief reporters and spoke on condition of anonymity. Afif had been especially visible after all-out war erupted between Israel and Hezbollah in September and the killing of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in an Israe

Hezbollah considers peace proposal as efforts to end conflict intensify

The US-Israeli proposal aims for a 60-day peace and is being portrayed as the basis of a lasting ceasefire, according to the first Lebanese official

Israeli strikes kill 11 as Lebanon cease-fire efforts appear to gain steam

Israeli strikes killed at least 11 people across Lebanon on Friday including a mother, father and their three kids in a home as rescue workers called off their search for survivors a day after an Israeli strike on a civil defence centre killed 14 emergency workers and volunteers. The airstrikes come as Lebanon's prime minister apparently urged Iran to convince the Hezbollah militant group to agree to a cease-fire deal with Israel, which could require the group to pull back from the Israel-Lebanon border. Since late September, Israel dramatically escalated its bombardment of Lebanon, vowing to cripple Hezbollah and end its barrages in Israel. More than 3,400 people have been killed in Lebanon by Israeli fire 80 per cent of them in the past month Lebanon's Health Ministry says. The Israel-Hamas war began after Palestinian militants stormed into Israel on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people mostly civilians and abducting 250 others. Lebanon's Hezbollah group began firing .

Israel Air Force strikes Hezbollah bases embedded in Beirut civilian area

Before the attack, the IDF took many steps to reduce the chance of harming civilians

Hezbollah claims missile attack on Israeli military base in Tel Aviv

Hezbollah said it used qualitative missiles to target the base, which it said belongs to the military intelligence division of the Israeli army

Human Rights Watch accuses Israel of war crimes, forced exile in Gaza Strip

Human Rights Watch says Israel is committing war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Gaza Strip, including massive forced displacements that amount to ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from parts of Gaza. Palestinians have been killed while evacuating under Israeli orders and in Israeli-designated humanitarian zones, where hundreds of thousands are crammed into squalid tent camps, according to the report released Thursday by the New York-based rights watchdog. The report said the widespread, deliberate demolition of homes and civilian infrastructure throughout Gaza, particularly in a military road that cuts Gaza in half as well as a buffer zone along the border, was likely to "permanently displace" many Palestinians. Israel said the report distorts the facts and leaves out important context, blaming civilian casualties on Hamas operating in residential areas and emphasizing that Israel does not deliberately target civilians. Israel's blistering 13-month war in Gaza has killed

Israeli strikes kill at least 12 Lebanese rescuers, 15 people in Syria

An Israeli airstrike killed at least 12 Lebanese rescue workers on Thursday inside a civil defence centre in the eastern city of Baalbek, according to health and rescue officials, hours after state media in Syria said Israeli strikes in and around the capital killed at least 15 people. Lebanese emergency workers were digging through the rubble Thursday evening to search for more of their colleagues still trapped under the destroyed rescue centre, the group said in a statement. At least three civil defence members were wounded. There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military. Lebanon's civil defence forces have no affiliation with the militant group Hezbollah, and they provide crucial rescue and medical services in one of the world's most war-torn nations. The Health Ministry condemned what it called a "barbaric attack on a Lebanese state-run health centre", adding that it is the second Israeli attack on a health emergency facility in less than two hours. In southern Lebano

Children from Gaza brought to heal wounds now caught in Lebanon conflict

When Zarifa Nawfal's family arrived in Beirut for her wounded daughter's surgery, one of the first things she wanted to do was go to the sea. The Mediterranean had been a constant companion at their home in Gaza before the war. The moment I smelled the sea, I felt at peace inside as if I were in Gaza, she said. But soon their place of refuge reminded her of home in far more distressing ways. Nawfal's 7-year-old daughter, Halima Abou Yassine, is one of a dozen severely wounded Palestinian children brought to Lebanon this year for treatment through a program launched by a British-Palestinian surgeon, Dr. Ghassan Abu Sitta. But months after their arrival, Lebanon is itself embroiled in a war some fear will end in Gaza-like destruction. In February, Nawfal was staying with her five children and her mother in an apartment in central Gaza. They had been displaced from their home in the north and Nawfal's husband was missing, likely dead. The children were filling water containers outs

Israel begins construction along UN-patrolled demilitarised zone in Syria

Israel has begun a construction project along the so-called Alpha Line that separates the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights from Syria, apparently laying asphalt for a road right along the frontier, satellite photos analysed by The Associated Press show. Israeli troops have entered the demilitarised zone during the work, the United Nations confirmed to the AP, a violation of the cease-fire rules governing the area. The work, which earlier satellite photos show began in earnest in late September, follows the completion by the Israeli military of new roadways and what appears to be a buffer zone along the Gaza Strip's frontier with Israel. The Israel military also has begun demolishing villages in Lebanon, where United Nations peacekeepers have come under fire. So far, there has been no major violence along the Alpha Line, which delineates the demilitarised zone between Syria and Israeli-occupied territory that UN peacekeepers have patrolled since 1974. Syria, which has been at war wit