A brutal Israeli air raid on Beirut last night failed to eliminate a top Hezbollah official but left at least 22 people dead and more than a hundred wounded in what was the deadliest single assault in more than a year of war with Hezbollah.
The punishing airstrikes on Lebanons capital targeted two residential buildings in separate neighbourhoods simultaneously.
One apartment block was utterly demolished, while the other suffered considerable damage as several storeys were blown apart.
But as civilians and rescuers were left to pick through the rubble in a desperate effort to evacuate the wounded, Hezbollahs Al Manar TV reported that Wafiq Safa, a top security official and close ally of assassinated leader Hassan Nasrallah, was not injured in the strike.
The shocking death toll is symptomatic of Israels renewed campaign to target Hezbollah strongholds in Beiruts tightly packed southern suburbs, where any airstrike is almost certain to result in collateral damage.
The attack came the same day Israeli forces fired on United Nations peacekeepers in southern Lebanon and wounded two of them, drawing widespread condemnation and prompting Italys Defence Ministry to summon Israels ambassador in protest.
A rescue worker stands on the rubble of destroyed buildings at the site of Thursdays Israeli airstrike in Beirut, Lebanon, Friday, Oct. 11, 2024
Lebanese women pass the destroyed buildings hit by an Israeli airstrike, in Beirut, Lebanon, Friday, Oct. 11, 2024
Lebanese people react as Israeli forces hit the center of Beirut on October 10, 2024
Blood stains are seen amidst the rubble at the site of an Israeli air strike, amid ongoing hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, in Beirut, Lebanon, October 11, 2024
Senior Hezbollah security official Wafiq Safa was not injured in the strike, it was reported
Lebanese civil defense and emergency teams conduct a search and rescue operation following the Israeli airstrike on the Nowayri area of Beirut, the capital of Lebanon on October 10, 2024
A man uses his mobile phone as flames and smoke rise at the scene of buildings hit by an Israeli airstrike in central Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024
Rescue workers use an excavator to clear the rubble of destroyed buildings, as they search for victims at the site of Thursdays Israeli airstrike, in Beirut, Lebanon, Friday, Oct. 11, 2024
Thursdays strikes followed a year of tit-for-tat exchanges between Hezbollah and Israel that boiled over into all-out war in recent weeks, with Israel carrying out waves of heavy airstrikes across Lebanon and launching a ground invasion.
Hezbollah meanwhile has expanded its rocket fire to more populated areas deeper inside Israel, causing few casualties but disrupting daily life.
Its fighters have also used cunning guerrilla tactics to inflict losses on IDF units tasked with clearing suspected Hezbollah positions in villages across southern Lebanon.
Witnesses reported a large number of ambulances and people gathering in the rubble of two Beirut sites that were hit, in the Ras al-Nabaa neighbourhood and Burj Abi Haidar area.
The Lebanese Health Ministry said at least 22 people were killed and 117 others wounded, without elaborating on their identities.
Recent Israeli airstrikes in neighbourhoods adjoining Beirut, in particular the densely populated southern suburbs, have killed Hezbollahs leader, Hassan Nasrallah, and other senior commanders.
But each strike comes with a significant humanitarian cost.
Before the latest strikes, Lebanons crisis response unit said Israeli attacks over the past day had killed 28 people, bringing the total to 2,169 killed in Lebanon since the war erupted last October.
Hezbollah began firing rockets into Israel on October 8, 2023, in support of Hamas and the Palestinians, drawing Israeli airstrikes in retaliation.
Hezbollah kept up rocket fire into Israel on Thursday, setting off air raid sirens in parts of northern Israel.
Several drones heading toward Israel were intercepted, the military said.
Hezbollah attacks have killed 28 civilians as well as 39 Israeli soldiers, both in northern Israel since October 2023 and southern Lebanon since Israel launched its ground invasion on September 30.
Israel says the invasion, so far focused on a narrow strip along the border, aims to push militants back so that tens of thousands of Israelis can return to their homes in the north.
Meanwhile, international observers are awaiting Israels response to an attack last week by Iran which launched some 180 ballistic missiles at targets across the nation in retaliation for the killing of top Hamas and Hezbollah militants.
Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said Wednesday that its response to the Iranian missile attack will be lethal and surprising, without providing further details, as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke with President Joe Biden.
Asked about the latest airstrikes in Lebanon, US Vice President Kamala Harris told reporters in Las Vegas: We have got to reach a cease-fire, both as it relates to whats happening in Lebanon, and of course Gaza.
We are working around the clock in that regard, but we need these wars to end and weve got to definitely de-escalate what is happening in the region.
Rescue workers use an excavator to clear the rubble of destroyed buildings as they search for victims at the site of Thursdays Israeli airstrike, in Beirut, Lebanon, Friday, Oct. 11, 2024
Residents remove the debris from their destroyed balcony at the site of Thursdays Israeli airstrike, in Beirut, Lebanon, Friday, Oct. 11, 2024
Members of the United Nations peacekeepers (UNIFIL) look at the Lebanese-Israeli border, as they stand on the roof of a watch tower in the town of Marwahin, in southern Lebanon
An image grab taken from a UGC video posted on social media on October 8, 2024 shows Israeli soldiers raising an Israeli flag in Lebanons southern border village of Maroun al-Ras
A man removes the rubble at the site of an Israeli air strike, amid ongoing hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, in Beirut, Lebanon, October 11, 2024
Debris and damage surround the site of an Israeli airstrike in Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024
In the wake of Israeli attacks on peacekeepers yesterday, the UNs peacekeeping mission in Lebanon, known as UNIFIL, released a damning statement accusing the IDF of repeatedly hitting their positions.
It said an Israeli tank directly fired on an observation tower at the forces headquarters in the town of Naqoura, and that soldiers had attacked a bunker near where peacekeepers were sheltering, damaging vehicles and a communication system.
It also reported that an Israeli drone was seen flying to the bunkers entrance.
The two UNIFIL troops wounded in the attacks and hospitalised are Indonesian, Italys Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani said.
The Israeli military acknowledged opening fire at a UN base in southern Lebanon on Thursday and said it had ordered the peacekeepers to remain in protected spaces.
Later Thursday, the UN peacekeeping chief said 300 peacekeepers in frontline positions on southern Lebanons border have been temporarily moved to larger bases, and plans to move another 200 will depend on security conditions as the conflict escalates.
Jean-Pierre Lacroix told an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council that peacekeepers with UNIFIL are staying in their positions, but because of air and ground attacks they cannot conduct patrols.
UNIFIL, which has more than 10,000 peacekeepers from dozens of countries, was created to oversee the withdrawal of Israeli troops from southern Lebanon after Israels 1978 invasion.
The United Nations expanded its mission following the 2006 war between Israel and Hezbollah, allowing peacekeepers to patrol a buffer zone set up along the border.
Israel accuses Hezbollah of establishing militant infrastructure along the border in violation of the UN Security Council resolution that ended the 2006 war.
The European Unions top diplomat, Josep Borrell, sharply condemned Israeli strikes that hit UNIFIL positions as an inadmissible act, for which there is no justification.
Italys Defence Minister Guido Crosetto went further, claiming Israel deliberately targeted the UNIFIL base in southern Lebanon in strikes that could constitute war crimes. Italy has some 1,000 troops deployed as part of UNIFIL.
Several other countries, including France, Spain and Jordan, also denounced the Israeli attacks.
Emergency workers rescue an elderly man from a damaged building hit by an Israeli airstrike at the site of an Israeli airstrike in Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024
Teams conduct search and rescue operations at the scene after the Israeli army launched an airstrike on the Nowayri area of Beirut, Lebanon on October 10, 2024
A member of the Lebanese army stands amidst the rubble at the site of an Israeli air strike, amid ongoing hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, in Beirut, Lebanon, October 11, 2024
Palestinians react after an Israeli strike hit the Rafida school housing displaced people in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip, on October 10, 2024
Displaced Palestinians search for missing people under the rubble of the destroyed Rufaida School, in Deir al-Balah, central Gaza Strip, 10 October 2024
Though attention has shifted to Israels close combat with Hezbollah in Lebanon and rising tensions with Iran in recent weeks, Israel has continued to strike at what it says are Palestinian militant targets across the Gaza Strip.
Earlier on Thursday, an Israeli strike on a school sheltering displaced people in central Gaza killed at least 27 people, Palestinian medical officials said.
The Israeli military said it targeted Palestinian militants, but people sheltering there said the strike hit a meeting of aid workers.
The dead included a child and seven women, according to the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital, where the bodies were brought - in some cases in pieces.
The Israeli military said it targeted a militant centre inside the school, without providing evidence. The IDF has repeatedly attacked schools that were turned into shelters in Gaza, accusing militants of taking cover in them.
There were no militants. There was no Hamas, said Iftikhar Hamouda, who had fled from northern Gaza earlier in the war.
We headed to tents. They bombed the tents... In the streets, they bombed us. In the markets, they bombed us. In the schools, they bombed us, she said. Where should we go?
Israels offensive in Gaza started after Hamas October 7 attack, when militants stormed into Israel, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting around 250 others.
Israels offensive has killed over 42,000 Palestinians, according to local health authorities, who do not specify between militants and civilians.
The war has destroyed large areas of Gaza and displaced around 90% of its population of 2.3 million people, often multiple times.