By Abdul Adil
(AA, Wafa, Al Jazeera, NNA):
LEBANON
At least 28 more people were killed in Israeli indiscriminate bombings across Lebanon, bringing the overall death toll since last year to 3,544, the Lebanese Health Ministry said on Tuesday.
In a statement, the ministry added that 107 others were also wounded, bringing the total number of injuries to 15,036 since October 2023.
More than 200 children have been killed in Lebanon since Israel launched a ground invasion and air campaign focused on its northern neighbour two months ago, UNICEF says.
UNICEF said on Tuesday that more than three children on average have been killed in Lebanon every day for the last two months, lamenting that “the intolerable is quietly transforming into the acceptable.”
“Despite more than 200 children killed in Lebanon in less than two months, a disconcerting pattern has emerged: their deaths are met with inertia from those able to stop this violence,” UNICEF spokesperson James Elder said in a press briefing in Geneva.
“For the children of Lebanon, it has become a silent normalization of horror,” Elder lamented, adding that at the same period, “many, many more” have been injured and traumatized daily.
He said, “We must hope humanity never again witnesses the ongoing level of carnage of children in Gaza, though there are chilling similarities for children in Lebanon.”
Listing the “chilling” similarities between Gaza and Lebanon, he said hundreds of children have been made homeless in the country, medical facilities are under attack, all schools are closed, “alarming signs” of emotional turmoil are becoming evident in children, and lastly, “the escalation of children killed is eliciting no meaningful response from those with influence.”
“And once more, the cries of children go unheard, the world’s silence grows deafening, and again we allow the unimaginable to become the landscape of childhood,” he added, calling it “a horrific and unacceptable new normal.”
At least five people were killed and 24 others injured in an Israeli airstrike on the Zuqaq al-Blat area in central Beirut, Lebanon’s Health Ministry reported.
The attack marked the third Israeli bombing in Beirut’s heart within 24 hours, following strikes on the Ras Al Naba’a and Mar Elias neighborhoods.
Earlier, Lebanon’s official news agency reported that the airstrike on Zuqaq al-Blat had resulted in four deaths and 18 injured, though further details on the specific location of the attack, such as whether it targeted a home or another building, were not provided.
Zuqaq al-Blat is located just 500 meters from Lebanon’s government and parliament buildings.
A ministry statement confirmed the casualty count, noting that it included five fatalities and 24 injuries.
On Sunday, Israeli airstrikes hit a building in the Ras Al Naba’a area of Beirut, followed by another targeting the Mar Elias district, resulting in dozens of deaths and injuries.
On Monday, the Health Ministry announced the final casualty figures from Israeli airstrikes targeting Beirut the previous day. The ministry reported that the strike on Ras Al Naba’a killed seven people, including a woman, while injuring 16 others.
The strike on Mar Elias resulted in four fatalities, including a woman, and 29 injuries, according to the ministry.
Meanwhile, Lebanon filed a new complaint with the UN Security Council on Tuesday regarding Israel’s ongoing military onslaught on the country.
A Foreign Ministry statement said that the complaint detailed Israeli violations and attacks in Lebanon from Oct. 2 until Nov. 11.
The ministry said the complaint aims “to document the effects of Israeli aggression and its consequences on Lebanon, and to remind the international community and the Security Council of the need to assume responsibility and take action to stop it.”
It referred to the abduction of Lebanese sea captain Imad Amhaz in the northern city of Batroun, Israel’s continued ground incursions, and the destruction of entire villages and neighborhoods such as Yaron, Aytaroun, Maroun al-Ras, and Mays al-Jabal.
“Israel continued to target the Lebanese army, as well as civilian facilities and civilians…resulting in dozens of casualties,” the ministry said.
The complaint listed Israeli attacks on ambulances, rescue teams, and their workers in Adloun, Deir Qanoun al-Nahr, Ras al-Ain, and Ain Baal in southern Lebanon, which resulted in the death of 11 paramedics.
Lebanon renewed its call for the UN Security Council to “condemn the escalating Israeli aggression and take firm action to stop it, and to compel Israel to immediately and unconditionally withdraw from the occupied Lebanese territories and fully, comprehensively, and simultaneously implement Security Council Resolution 1701, which Lebanon insists upon, to ensure regional security and stability.”
It warned that the Israeli onslaught “would have serious political and security consequences both at present and in the future.”
Tel Aviv expanded the conflict by launching a ground assault into southern Lebanon on Oct. 1 this year.
An Israeli soldier was killed and three others were seriously injured in clashes in southern Lebanon on Tuesday, the Israeli army said.
A military statement said that the four soldiers were members of the Golani Brigade.
While the army did not provide details about the circumstances of the attack, the Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth said the casualties occurred in a drone attack.
According to the Israeli website Srugim, Hezbollah launched a drone targeting a unit from the combat team of the 53rd Battalion, which was operating under the command of the Golani Brigade and the 36th Division.
A preliminary investigation revealed that the soldiers were outside their armored military vehicle at the time of the attack, the website said.
Israeli daily Haaretz said that 43 soldiers have been killed since the start of the Israeli ground incursion in southern Lebanon on Oct. 1 this year.
Six Israelis were injured in a new rocket barrage from Lebanon on Tuesday as cross-border warfare continues to escalate between Tel Aviv and Hezbollah.
A military statement said 75 rockets were fired from Lebanon, triggering air-raid sirens in northern and central Israel.
The army said some of the rockets were intercepted, while others impacted open areas.
Israeli media said sirens sounded in the Tel Aviv metropolitan area in central Israel after the rocket fire.
Israel’s national ambulance service Magen David Adom said its medics treated four people from light wounds by broken glass in central Israel.
Israel’s Army Radio also said two more people sustained light injuries, without providing further details.
Tuesday’s attack was the second on the Tel Aviv area in less than 24 hours after a rocket hit the city of Ramat Gan, east of Tel Aviv, on Monday night.
Hezbollah, for its part, said it targeted the Glilot base, north of Tel Aviv, with a salvo of advanced rockets.
Glilot military base is a key intelligence facility and home to the army’s Unit 8200, responsible for intelligence gathering. It also hosts a military intelligence school and the headquarters of Israel’s Mossad spy agency.
The Lebanese group said it also fired a squadron of drones on the Beit Lid military base, which houses training camps for the Nahal and paratroopers brigades east of Netanya in northern Israel.
Drones also targeted the Ramat David base, a major site for combat squadrons in northern Israel, “hitting its targets accurately,” Hezbollah said.
GAZA
At least 50 more Palestinians were killed in relentless Israeli attacks in the Gaza Strip, bringing the overall death toll since October last year to 43,972, the Health Ministry in the enclave said on Tuesday.
A ministry statement added that some 104,008 others were injured in the ongoing assault.
“The Israeli occupation has committed three massacres of families in the last 24 hours, resulting in 50 deaths and 110 injuries,” the ministry said.
“Many people are still trapped under the rubble and on the roads as rescue teams are unable to reach them,” it added.
At least eight Palestinians were killed this evening in an Israeli airstrike which targeted a building in the town of Beit Lahiya, north of the Gaza Strip, local sources reported.
According to witnesses, the attack targeted a residential building, home to members of the al-Kahlout family and displaced civilians, near the Gaza Electric Company in the town of Beit Lahiya.
Emergency responders managed to pull out some of the victims and transfer them to Kamal Adwan Hospital. However, reports indicate that several people remain trapped under the rubble, with rescue teams unable to access the site due to the ongoing airstrikes and the scale of the destruction.
Israeli air strikes on the Bureij and Nuseirat refugee camps have killed at least six people.
Earlier, an attack hit a residential block in Nuseirat, killing three people.
Another raid on a residential block in Bureij killed three more people, Palestine’s Wafa news agency reported.
Several of the wounded were taken to Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in nearby Deir el-Balah while the fate of many remains unknown as people try to dig in the debris of collapsed buildings for survivors, the news agency said.
Two civilians, including photojournalist, were killed and others were injured on Tuesday, as a result of the Israeli warplanes bombing the Sabra neighborhood south of Gaza City.
Medical sources reported that two people, one of them photographer Ahmed Abu Sharia, were killed in an Israeli airstrike targeting the vicinity of Al-Iman Mosque in the Sabra neighborhood south of Gaza City.
An infant was killed this morning as a result of the Israeli artillery shelling of a house in the New Camp area northwest of Nuseirat in the central Gaza Strip.
One person was killed in a drone strike in the northern town of Beit Lahia, the source said.
Israeli forces also bombed the refugee camp of Jabalia in northern Gaza, leaving one person dead, the source added.
The body of another Palestinian was recovered after Israeli shelling of a group of civilians in the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza.
Israeli artillery shelling was also reported in Khan Younis and Rafah in southern Gaza, but no information was yet available about injuries.
Witnesses said that Israeli army forces continued their campaign to blow up Palestinian homes in Jabalia and Beit Lahia in northern Gaza.
WEST BANK
Three Palestinians were killed by Israeli army fire in a military raid near the West Bank city of Jenin on Tuesday, a local official said.
Jenin Governor Kamal Abu al-Rub told Anadolu that three young men lost their lives after Israeli forces besieged and bombed a house and a mobile home in the town of Qabatiya town near Jenin city in the northern West Bank.
“Israeli forces damaged infrastructure and streets during its ongoing raid in the city and its camp since dawn,” he added.
Local sources reported that Israeli soldiers opened fire on the two men, preventing medical teams of the Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS) from reaching them in time to provide assistance. As a result, the two young men succumbed to their injuries and were later transferred to Jenin Governmental Hospital.
The two young men were identified as Feras al-Jaser and Rami al-Huwaiti. With their killing, the number of Palestinians killed by Israeli occupation forces in Jenin today has risen to five.
Witnesses said Israeli forces backed by a bulldozer raided the town after midnight and destroyed infrastructure in the area.
At least 785 Palestinians have since been killed and nearly 6,450 others injured by Israeli army fire in the occupied territory, according to the Health Ministry
The official Palestinian news agency Wafa said a number of Palestinians sustained suffocation from tear gas fired by the Israeli forces during their raid into the Al-Khader town, near Bethlehem city, in the southern West Bank.
The Israeli army also raided the town of Idna near the southern city of Hebron.
Clashes also erupted as the Israeli army stormed the Kafr Ni’ma village, near Ramallah city, in the central West Bank.
The Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) says Israeli forces used one of its teams as human shields in Jenin, in the occupied West Bank.
Soldiers detained the paramedics inside a house “while they were en route to evacuate an injured person in the eastern neighbourhood of Jenin during a raid on the house”, the emergency service said.
The Wafa news agency reported that the Israeli forces used bullets and stun grenades to disperse the Palestinians, but no casualties were reported there.
In the northern West Bank, the Israeli army also raided several villages in southern Nablus city, including Burqa, Qabalan, and Beita.
Meanwhile, the Israeli army ordered the cessation of construction on 14 Palestinian houses and facilities in the Hammamat al-Malih area in the northern Jordan Valley region of the West Bank.
Israeli authorities demolished a mosque in the town of Jabal al-Mukaber in occupied East Jerusalem on Tuesday, in the latest demolition of Palestinian structures in the West Bank.
Israeli police escorted teams to raze the 50-square-meter Muslim house of worship in the town, citing lack of a building permit, witnesses said.
According to witnesses, the mosque was built 20 years ago to serve Palestinians residing in the area.
Israeli authorities issued a demolition order for the mosque 16 years ago, but it was postponed due to legal appeals before a final notice was issued two weeks ago.
Palestinian, international and Israeli rights groups accuse the Israeli authorities of deliberately restricting construction activity for Palestinians in East Jerusalem.
On Friday, the Jerusalem Affairs Ministry condemned Israel’s systemic demolition of Palestinian homes in the occupied East Jerusalem as “ethnic cleansing and a war crime.”
According to the official Wall and Settlement Resistance Commission, the Israeli authorities have demolished over 500 homes and facilities across the occupied West Bank since Oct. 7 last year.
[Photo: Palestinians try to continue their daily lives among the rubbles of demolished buildings under the difficult conditions due to Israeli indiscriminate attacks in Khan Yunis, Gaza on November 17, 2024. Photojournalist: Hani Alshaer/AA]
