By Abdul Adil
(AA, Al Jazeera, Wafa): At least 1,473 people have been killed in Lebanon since mid-September by Israeli Defence Forces indiscriminate bombings in Lebanon, according to the Lebanese Health Ministry. Number of people killed by Israeli army since Oct. 8, 2023 has risen to 2,119,including 127 children and 261 women, with 10,019 injured, according to latest figures from the Health Ministry. Meanwhile, in Gaza, Israeli forces indiscriminate bombings has killed 56 Palestinians and injured 278 others in the last 24 hours.
Lebanese group Hezbollah [Hizbullah] said Tuesday that its fighters pushed away Israeli ground forces attempting to infiltrate into the border town of Al-Labouneh in southern Lebanon.
The group said Israeli forces sought to enter the town from behind the positions of the UN peacekeeping forces (UNIFIL) in the area.
Hezbollah said its fighters engaged with Israeli forces with “appropriate weapons,” causing casualties among them and forcing the infiltrating troops to retreat.
Israel reported the launch of rocket salvos by the Lebanese group Hezbollah on Tuesday as Tel Aviv pressed ahead with its air and ground attacks on Lebanon.
A military statement said around 85 rockets were fired towards Haifa and Krayot settlement in northern Israel with some of the projectiles intercepted.
The army said another wave of 20 rockets was launched at Haifa, causing damage to several homes. A woman was injured by shrapnel.
Israeli police also reported damage to some buildings in Haifa’s suburbs, including Kiryat Yam and Kiryat Motzkin.
Hezbollah, for its part, confirmed the rocket fire on Haifa and Krayot settlement, saying the attacks were in response to “Israel’s brutal assaults on Lebanese civilians, villages and towns.”
In addition, the Israeli army deployed additional fourth division on Tuesday for its ongoing ground invasion of southern Lebanon.
A military statement said the army’s 146th Reserve Division began ground operations in the western sector of southern Lebanon.
Three other divisions — the 98th, 36th, and 91st — are already operating in the central and eastern sectors of southern Lebanon.
The EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell on Tuesday stressed the urgent need for a cease-fire in Lebanon, highlighting that 20% of the population has been displaced due to intensified bombings by Israel and escalating conflict across the region.
“The bombings are incredibly strong, and towns centers are being affected too,” he said.
Hezbollah said Tuesday it backs political efforts by Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri to reach a cease-fire with Israel.
“We have full confidence in the big brother Berri,” Hezbollah Deputy Secretary-General Naim Qassem said in a televised speech.
“We support political efforts led by Berri with its primary goal of a cease-fire,” he added.
Meanwhile UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres called for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and Lebanon.
“Attacks, including on civilians, are threatening the entire region,” Guterres said.
“All people in the region deserve to live in peace.”
Meanwhile in Gaza, at least 56 more Palestinians were killed in relentless Israeli attacks in the Gaza Strip, bringing the overall death toll since last year to 41,965, the Health Ministry in the enclave said on Tuesday.
A ministry statement added that some 97,590 others were injured in the ongoing assault.
“Israeli forces killed 56 people and injured 278 others in three massacres of families in the last 24 hours,” the ministry said.
“Many people are still trapped under the rubble and on the roads as rescuers are unable to reach them,” it added.
Several Palestinians were killed in fresh Israeli airstrikes in the northern Gaza Strip on Tuesday, medical sources and witnesses said.
At least 25 Palestinians – including five children and two women – have been killed in Israeli air strikes on central Gaza as soldiers “systematically work to empty” the war-battered north.
Residents flee from one neighbourhood to another after a days-long Israeli army siege in the northern Jabalia refugee camp with hospitals overwhelmed by the dead and wounded.
A fighter jet hit a home in Jabalia in northern Gaza, killing several people and injuring others, a medical source said.
Witnesses also reported fatalities when Israeli forces opened fire on Gazans fleeing for safety west of Jabalia.
Artillery shelling was also reported in the vicinity of Kamal Adwan Hospital in the northern city of Beit Lahia, but no information was yet available about casualties.
Eight people were killed when a drone shelled a group of civilians in Khirbet Al-Adas, north of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, a medical source said.
“The strike occurred as civilians gathered to fill containers with water,” an eyewitness told Anadolu Agency.
Nine more people lost their lives when warplanes hit a three-story building in the Bureij refugee camp in central Gaza, medics said.
Al-Awda Hospital in central Gaza confirmed the fatalities, adding that 27 other people were injured in the attack.
A medical source said a woman and child were also killed in another strike targeting a home in the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza.
A Palestinian child was also killed in an airstrike on a mosque north of Rafah in southern Gaza.
Medical sources in the Strip said that several civilians were killed after Israeli warplanes bombed a civilian vehicle at the western entrance to Nuseirat in the central Gaza Strip.
At least one young man was also killed and others were injured after an Israeli warplane targeted agricultural land near the entrance to the town of Al-Zawaida in the central Gaza Strip.
Meanwhile, three civilians were injured in Israeli airstrike on a tower in the Al-Alami area in Jabalia camp in the north.
The Israeli warplanes also bombed a house on Al-Shuhada Street in the Al-Rimal neighborhood in the center of Gaza City.
A fire also broke out in one of the houses as a result of Israeli bombing that targeted the eastern areas of the Al-Zeitoun neighborhood in the southeast of Gaza City.
Eight Palestinians were killed and many others were injured on Tuesday when an Israeli drone bombed a gathering of civilians at a water filling station north of Rafah city in the southern Gaza Strip.
Medical sources at the Gaza European Hospital reported that the bodies of eight people were taken to the hospital after the occupation bombed a group of civilians in Khirbet al-Adas north of Rafah.
Eyewitnesses indicated that a drone targeted a group of citizens while they were at a water filling point in the Khirbet al-Adas area, which resulted in the killing and injury of many in the area.
Meanwhile, Gaza’s Health Ministry warned that hospitals in northern Gaza are about to cease operations due to fuel shortages.
Israeli military figures released by the army showed that some 730 soldiers have been killed and 4,640 others injured since the outbreak of the Gaza conflict on Oct. 7, 2023.
In Israel, at least 1,139 people were killed in the Hamas-led attacks on October 7 and more than 200 people were taken captive.
[Photo: Relatives of Palestinians who were killed by Israeli army’s attack on house at Bureij refugee camp mourn during funeral ceremony after the bodies are brought to the morgue of Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir al-Balah, Gaza on 08 10, 2024. Photojournalist: Ashraf Amra /AA]
