Israel is continuing its massive airstrikes against the Shiite Hezbollah militia in southern Lebanon. “Dozens” of warplanes were involved in the operation against Hezbollah targets, army spokesman Daniel Hagari said Saturday night.
The Israeli military had earlier announced that it had destroyed thousands of rocket launchers in southern Lebanon during the day. They were “ready for immediate launch towards Israeli territory.” 180 Hezbollah targets were attacked. The Israeli military also said that the Hezbollah militia fired about 90 rockets from Lebanon into Israel until late Saturday afternoon.
Also on Friday, Israel killed a senior commander of the pro-Iranian militia in its northern neighbor. In addition to Ibrahim Aqil, at least 15 other Hezbollah fighters were killed in the attack on a southern suburb of Beirut. Hezbollah said commander Ahmed Wahbi, who was part of Aqil’s elite Radwan unit, was also killed.
Lebanese Ministry: Children among the dead
Wahbi led military operations by the Radwan unit in support of the radical Islamist Hamas between October 7 and early this year. Lebanon’s Health Ministry said on Saturday that 37 people, including three children and seven women, were killed in the attack.
According to Israeli army spokesman Daniel Hagari, the strike targeted commanders “involved in planning operations involving anti-tank missiles, rocket fire and the planned invasion of Israeli territory.” Accordingly, Aqil and the other Hezbollah commanders killed in the strike were planning an attack on northern Israel in which they, like the radical Palestinian Islamist organization Hamas on October 7, “intended to infiltrate Israeli communities and murder innocent civilians.”
Minister of Defense: “Enemies no longer have a place of refuge”
After Aqil’s killing, the Israeli military reassured on Friday that it was not trying to expand the conflict in Lebanon. “We are not aiming for a broad escalation in the region,” Hagari told reporters. Meanwhile, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant wrote on the online service X that Israel’s “enemies” no longer had a “safe haven.”
Source: Krone
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