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Israel continued to pound Lebanon with a fierce wave of air strikes overnight in the heaviest 24 hours of bombing since it stepped up its campaign against militant group Hizbollah at the end of last month.
The bombardment lit up Beirut’s skyline on Sunday, as blasts rocked the Lebanese capital throughout the night. Targets included a building near the road to Beirut’s airport, where the strikes set off huge fires. Smoke was still rising from the area in the morning.
The explosions began around midnight, after Israel’s military warned residents to evacuate neighbourhoods in Beirut’s southern suburbs, which Hizbollah dominates, including Haret Hreik and Choueifat. Another powerful blast was heard on Sunday morning.
The intense bombing followed a day of sporadic air strikes and the constant buzz of reconnaissance drones, both of which have become almost routine for the city’s residents. Data from Acled, which has been mapping strikes, suggested it was the most intense night in Israel’s two week air campaign.
Israel’s military has said it is targeting sites linked to the militant group and said it had struck weapons storage facilities and other infrastructure linked to Hizbollah in Beirut overnight.
Bachir Khodr, the governor of Baalbek-Hermel in northeastern Lebanon, said one air strike hit 500m-700m away from the city’s Roman ruins, a Unesco world heritage site, on Sunday. Attacks at the location would have “negative repercussions”, he said.
Israel said Hizbollah had also launched projectiles across the border, some of which were intercepted. The militant group said it successfully struck a group of Israeli soldiers with a salvo of rockets.
It is not possible to verify the battlefield claims on either side.
Israel has intensified its assault against Hizbollah over the past two weeks as it shifted its focus from Gaza to the northern front. It has killed Hizbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, launched air strikes across Lebanon and sent troops into Lebanon’s south for the first time in almost two decades.
More than 2,000 people have been killed in Lebanon since last October, when the militant group began launching rockets against the Jewish state “in solidarity” with Hamas following its deadly assault on southern Israel. The majority have died in the past two weeks, according to data from the Lebanese health ministry, which said 23 people were killed and 93 wounded in attacks throughout the country on Saturday.
More than 1.2mn people have also been displaced from their homes because of the fighting.
Foreigners have also continued to leave Lebanon, with multiple nations chartering planes to help repatriate their citizens in recent days.
Meanwhile, Israeli police said several people were injured on Sunday after a gunman opened fire at the central bus station in the southern city of Beersheva. Israeli paramedics said one person had been killed and 10 had been wounded.
While Lebanon’s only airport has remained open, most airlines have suspended flights because of the heavy bombardment in the nearby southern suburbs.
Israel has issued multiple evacuation orders in recent days, warning people across the south to move north. It has given similar orders in its war against Hamas in Gaza ahead of big offensives. The latest came on Sunday.
The escalation has pushed the Middle East closer to all-out war. The region is bracing for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s response to an Iranian missile barrage fired at Israel on Tuesday.
Tehran said the missile attack was in response to the assassination of Nasrallah and the killing of Hamas’s political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran in July.
Israel also carried out further strikes in Gaza overnight, including bombing a mosque and a school in Deir al-Balah. Palestinian health officials said 26 people had been killed and “dozens” injured in the strikes. The Israeli military said it had targeted Hamas militants using the sites to direct operations against its forces.
Israel also announced a fresh offensive in the Jabalia neighbourhood of northern Gaza, marking a return to an area where its military has carried out several large operations throughout the war in the besieged enclave.
It called for the complete evacuation of almost all of northern Gaza, echoing warnings it made there throughout the year before major offensives. Around 300,000 people are estimated to have remained in the badly destroyed area.
French President Emmanuel Macron on Saturday renewed his calls for a ceasefire in Gaza, saying weapons shipments to Israel for its campaign in the enclave should be suspended and warning against further escalation in Lebanon.
“The Lebanese people must not in turn be sacrificed, Lebanon cannot become another Gaza,” he said in an interview with the France Inter radio station.
Netanyahu hit back, branding those supporting an arms embargo a “disgrace”. “Shame on them,” he said. “Israel will win with or without their support. But their shame will continue long after the war is won.”
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