The war in the Gaza Strip between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas entered its twelfth month on Saturday. On Sunday, September 8, the Israeli army announced that it had carried out strikes overnight against military buildings of the Islamist movement Hezbollah in southern Lebanon.
“In the night [de samedi à dimanche]Israeli air force struck Hezbollah military buildings in the regions of Aïtaroun, Maroun Al-Ras and Yaroun, in southern Lebanon”the army said in a statement, claiming to have intercepted a number of rockets fired from Lebanon.
Response to the deaths of rescue workers in Lebanon
Hezbollah claimed to have fired a salvo of rockets at a northern Israeli town early Sunday in retaliation for an attack that the Lebanese health ministry said killed three rescue workers in southern Lebanon. “In response to enemy attacks (…) and in particular on the attack” which cost the lives of rescuers on Saturday, Hezbollah fighters have “bombed (…) Kiryat Shmona with a salvo of rockets »the Iran-backed group said in a statement.
The Lebanese Health Ministry announced on Saturday that three rescue workers were killed and two others wounded in an Israeli attack on a civil defense team. The latter “put out fires caused by recent Israeli strikes in the village of Froun”the ministry said in a statement, adding that two other people were injured, one of whom was in critical condition.
In a statement, the civil defense confirmed the death of three of its members in “an Israeli strike that targeted a fire engine”The ministry condemned “This blatant Israeli attack which targeted a team from an official organ of the Lebanese state”.
Southern Lebanon has been the scene of almost daily exchanges of fire between Hezbollah and the Israeli army since the start of the war in Gaza on October 7, 2023, between Israel and Hamas, an ally of the pro-Iran Lebanese movement.
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More than 600 dead in Lebanon, 50 in Israel
In Lebanon, the cross-border violence left 614 dead, mostly Hezbollah fighters, but also at least 138 civilians, according to a count by Agence France-Presse. On the Israeli side, twenty-four soldiers and twenty-six civilians were killed, according to the army.
In a statement, Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati called Saturday’s attack a “new aggression” and of “flagrant violation of international law”The Amal movement, an ally of Hezbollah, later said that two of its members were among the victims, killed “while they were carrying out their humanitarian duty”According to the Ministry of Health, this attack is “the second of its kind against an emergency team in less than twelve hours”.
Earlier Saturday, the ministry said that two emergency personnel from the Hezbollah-affiliated Islamic Health Committee were injured when “The Israeli enemy has[vait] deliberately targeted” the area surrounding the fire they were going to put out in Qabrikha (south), causing them to lose control of their vehicle.
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