Around 250 projectiles were fired on Sunday from Lebanon towards Israel by the Islamist movement Hezbollah, the Israeli army announced to AFP, one of the highest figures in recent weeks.
Air raid sirens were sounded several times in many parts of the country.
According to the army, the highest number of projectiles (350) was recorded on September 24, 2024, a few days before Israel launched a ground offensive against Hezbollah in southern Lebanon.
For its part, Hezbollah declared in a press release that it had “launched, for the first time, an air attack using a swarm of combat drones on the Ashdod naval base”, in southern Israel. .
Later in the day, the pro-Iranian movement added that it had fired “a salvo of advanced missiles and a swarm of combat drones” on a “military target” in Tel Aviv (center) and missiles on the base of the military intelligence from neighboring Glilot.
Asked by AFP, the Israeli army did not comment on these statements.
According to first aid and hospital organizations, at least eleven people were injured, including a man in his sixties in “moderate to serious” condition.
The army claimed to have intercepted some of the rockets fired by Hezbollah.
In the occupied West Bank, 13 Palestinians were also lightly or moderately injured when an interceptor missile fell on several houses in the Tulkarem camp.
The large volleys of fire follow at least four Israeli strikes in central Beirut last week, one of which killed Hezbollah spokesman Mohammed Afif.
In a speech given on Wednesday, the leader of the Lebanese Islamist movement, Naïm Qassem, declared that the response to the recent strikes on the capital should be “awaited in the center of Tel Aviv”.
The Lebanese army, for its part, said that one soldier was killed on Sunday and 18 others were injured, “some seriously, following an Israeli attack targeting a Lebanese army center in Amriyeh », in southern Lebanon.
The clashes come as the US president’s special envoy, Amos Hochstein, reported “further progress” towards a truce during a tour of Lebanon and Israel this week.
Although the Lebanese army is not a party to the war between Israel and Hezbollah, Israeli strikes have killed 19 Lebanese soldiers in the past two months, according to authorities.
Israel launched massive strikes in Lebanon on September 23 against Hezbollah which, after the attacks of October 7, 2023, had opened a “support front” for Hamas by firing rockets into Israeli territory.
Lebanon’s Health Ministry estimates that at least 3,670 people have been killed in the country since October 2023, most since September of this year.
On the Israeli side, 82 soldiers and 47 civilians were killed in 13 months.
