Six children among 11 civilians killed in Israeli strikes on Lebanon: Sources

Six children were among 11 civilians killed by Israeli strikes on villages across southern Lebanon on Wednesday, according to a Reuters report, citing hospital director and three Lebanese security sources. Israel said the strikes were response to a Hezbollah rocket attack that killed one of its soldier. For over four months, Hezbollah and the Israeli military have engaged in continuous exchanges of fire along the Israel-Lebanon border. The conflict escalated when the Lebanese armed group launched rockets across the disputed frontier in solidarity with its Palestinian ally, Hamas. Tragically, in the village of al-Sawana, an Israeli strike claimed the lives of a woman and her two children, as reported by two security sources. Further casualties ensued in Nabatieh, where a strike on a building resulted in the deaths of four children, three women, and a man, according to Hassan Wazni, the director of the town’s hospital, along with three other security sources. Seven individuals sustained injuries in the attack, as confirmed by Wazni to Reuters. Four Hezbollah fighters were killed in separate strikes, according to the group and security sources. Hezbollah did not announce any operations on Wednesday. The head of its executive council said Israel’s attacks on Lebanon “cannot pass without a response”. An Israeli government spokesperson told journalists that rocket barrages from Lebanon on Wednesday morning had killed an Israeli soldier, and eight others were hospitalised. “As we have made clear time and time again, Israel is not interested in a war on two fronts. But if provoked, we will respond forcefully,” Reuters quoted spokesperson Ilana Stein as saying. “The current reality, where tens of thousands of Israelis are displaced and cannot return to their homes, is unbearable. They must be able to return home and live in peace and security,” Stein added. Stein and Israel’s military said the military had responded to cross-border rocket fire from Lebanon. Israel’s military chief Herzi Halevi, who had been meeting the heads of local municipalities in northern Israel on Wednesday, said that despite what he described as achievements against Hezbollah, this was “not the time to stop.” Hezbollah head Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah said in a televised address on Tuesday that his group would only stop its exchanges of fire if a full ceasefire was reached for Gaza. The cross-border shelling has already killed more than 200 people in Lebanon, including more than 170 Hezbollah fighters, as well as around a dozen Israeli troops and five Israeli civilians. It has also displaced tens of thousands of people in the border areas of each country. With inputs from agencies