Israeli warplanes struck more than 300 Hezbollah positions in southern Lebanon on Monday, leading Israel to warn civilians to evacuate the area as more intense attacks were imminent.
Lebanese authorities said the attack killed at least 182 people, including “children, women and emergency workers,” and injured more than 700.
The Israel Defense Forces say Hezbollah Fired At least 150 rockets, missiles and other projectiles were fired into Israeli territory on Saturday and Sunday, most of the attacks launched from inside Lebanon and some reaching deeper into Israel than previous Hezbollah attacks.
“This morning, based on precise intelligence, the IDF launched widespread and aggressive airstrikes aimed at degrading the capabilities and infrastructure of the Hezbollah terrorist organization in Lebanon, infrastructure that Hezbollah has spent years building,” said Israel Defense Forces (IDF) spokesman Maj. Gen. Daniel Hagari. said in a statement on Monday.
Haghari said the operation was focused on eliminating Hezbollah artillery hidden inside civilian buildings that the group is using to carry out indiscriminate shelling of Israeli civilian targets.
“The scenes we see today in southern Lebanon show Hezbollah weapons exploding inside homes. Every house we attack is equipped with weapons – rockets, missiles and drones aimed at killing Israeli civilians,” he said.
“We are preparing to strike terrorist targets in the Bekaa Valley region in the near future. We are aware that Hezbollah is storing strategic weapons in civilian buildings, using them as human shields and putting residents at risk,” he said.
Haghari warned Lebanese residents in the Bekaa Valley to “immediately evacuate” “houses where rockets and weapons are stored.”
“You can see the operation we are currently conducting in southern Lebanon. Hezbollah wants to fire these weapons at Israel and we will not allow that! Stay away for your own protection,” he warned.
“Hassan Nasrallah is lying to you and putting you in danger,” Haghari said, referring to the Hezbollah leader. “Please listen to the warnings and messages from the IDF for the safety of you and your families.”
Israeli military officials said Hagari's warning to evacuate civilians from areas surrounding Hezbollah's weapons caches was the first such warning issued by the IDF to Lebanon.
Hagari also assured Israelis that the IDF “will continue to do everything in our power to protect you,” a promise echoed by other Israeli officials who noted that Hezbollah has deliberately attacked civilian targets, displacing tens of thousands of Israeli civilians from their homes, with little condemnation from the international community.
“We have to get our people back to their homes. This is clearly a very dangerous situation that could escalate dramatically,” Israeli President Isaac Herzog said Sunday, explaining why intense operations to eliminate Hezbollah's terror arsenal are necessary.
Nasrallah Dare In a fiery speech on Thursday, he warned that Israel would launch a ground invasion and said it was a “historic opportunity” for Hezbollah to defeat the IDF. carried out They flew over Beirut during Nasrallah's speech, shaking the windows, to prove that the Hezbollah leader was not speaking in person in Lebanon, as he claimed, but was delivering pre-recorded remarks from a hidden location.
Israeli military officials said While there were no “immediate plans” for a ground operation as of Monday, the airstrikes will continue to degrade Hezbollah's ability to strike targets inside Israel.
Lebanese authorities on Monday ordered hospitals to halt all procedures except emergency surgeries to treat those wounded in Israeli airstrikes, and schools in southern Beirut and eastern Lebanon have been closed and evacuated.
The Israeli operation is astonishing Pager and radio explosion Hundreds of Hezbollah leaders and fighters have been killed or neutralised in the last week. On Friday, top Hezbollah members gathered on the outskirts of Beirut for a face-to-face planning session, during which the IDF Targeted The meeting was accompanied by precision air strikes that killed many of Hezbollah's top military officials.
Israeli President Herzog said Monday that “Israel does not seek war” but that “we have the right and the obligation to defend our people.”
Herzog posted an IDF video showing Hezbollah storing “thousands of long-range rockets” in “homes, living rooms, bedrooms and kitchens.”
“Would you accept this happening in your home or your neighbour's home? What country would accept its people living under such threats from their neighbours?” he asked.
“For those who don't understand yet, let me make Israeli policy clear: We do not wait for threats, we preempt them. Anywhere, on any front, at any time. We will take out the officials, we will take out the terrorists, we will take out the missiles. And we will not stop.” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday to the Israeli public.
“I promised to change the security balance, the balance of power in the north, and that is exactly what we are doing, destroying thousands of missiles and rockets aimed at Israeli cities and people,” Netanyahu said.
Residents of southern Lebanon and parts of Beirut Reported On Monday morning, they received text messages and phone calls from Lebanese numbers warning them to leave Hezbollah positions. Some also reported hearing radio broadcasts warning them to evacuate.
Lebanon's Minister of Communications, Jonny Corum Claimed He argued that Israel did not infiltrate Lebanese networks to deliver these messages, and that the Lebanese systems were set up to reject all calls and messages from Israel.
Lebanon's Minister of Information, Ziad Makarie Condemned Denouncing the evacuation messages as a form of Israeli “psychological warfare,” McCarry urged Lebanese civilians to ignore them.
