Israeli airstrikes kill 10 across southern Lebanon as assault intensifies

The Israeli army mounted waves of airstrikes targeting multiple areas across southern Lebanon on Thursday, killing at least 10 people and injuring nine others, in the latest escalation in the Arab country. According to an Anadolu tally, warplanes bombed at least 44 towns across the country's south, including Bint Jbeil, Khiam, Al-Mansouri, and Kfardounin.

Casualties

The Lebanese Health Ministry said four people were killed and three others injured in a strike on the town of Ramadiyeh in the Tyre district. In another strike, the state-run National News Agency reported that three people were killed after a two-story building was hit in the town of Kfarsir. A municipal council member and two of his family members were also killed when Israeli warplanes struck a four-story building they were inside in the town of Zebdine, the agency said. Six people were also injured, including three critically, in an airstrike on a complex in the town of Kfar.

Conflict context

Israel has pounded Lebanon with airstrikes and launched a ground offensive in the south since a cross-border attack by Hezbollah on March 2. Lebanese authorities said that nearly 1,345 people have since been killed and 4,040 others wounded in the Israeli assault, with over one million displaced.

Regional escalation

The Lebanon campaign is part of broader regional escalation following the US-Israeli offensive on Iran that began Feb. 28, which has killed over 1,340 people in Iran. Hezbollah has fired barrages of rockets into Israel since early March, saying the attacks are in response to continued Israeli strikes on Lebanon and the killing of Iran's former Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.