The Israeli strike on the town of Aalmat, north of Beirut, on Sunday left 23 dead, including 7 children, said the Lebanese Ministry of Health, which has been publishing updated reports since the end of the morning. “The Israeli enemy's raid targeting Aalmat in the Jbeil region left 23 dead, including 7 children, and six injured”specified the ministry, adding that this risked further increasing, “human remains” having been removed from the rubble.
Images from Agence France-Presse (AFP) showed rescuers searching with their bare hands the rubble of a completely razed house, while an excavator removed the blocks of stone in a Shiite town located in the predominantly Christian mountain, about thirty kilometers from Beirut. The Israeli army has repeatedly targeted residential buildings which, according to Lebanese media, sometimes house people linked to Hezbollah among the displaced.
Present at the scene of the strike, Hezbollah MP in the region, Raed Berro, denied that members of his group were in the building. Important figures of the movement “are usually in the front line…not in the back”he told AFP. “Under the rubble, there are only children, old men and women”he added.
The area was cordoned off by Lebanese security forces and members of Hezbollah, noted an AFP correspondent on site. Dozens of people piled their belongings into their cars and fled the village.
