At least 10 people were killed and 50 wounded in Israeli strikes in Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley, two security sources told Reuters.
The strikes are among the deadliest reported in eastern Lebanon in recent weeks and risk rupturing a US-brokered ceasefire between Hezbollah and Israel, strained by frequent accusations of violations.
In a post on X on Friday evening, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said: “STRUCK: Hezbollah command centers used to advance terror attacks against IDF troops and Israel, in the Baalbek area in Lebanon.
“Within the command centers, weapons and funds utilized by Hezbollah were being stored, constituting a violation of the understandings between Israel”.
Sources said a senior Hezbollah official was among the dead.
There was no immediate comment from Hezbollah.
Separately, the IDF posted hours earlier: “In response to repeated ceasefire violations, the IDF struck a Hamas command center, from which terrorists operated, in the Ain al-Hilweh area in southern Lebanon.”
Ain al-Hilweh is a densely populated Palestinian refugee camp near Sidon.
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Israeli airstrikes in several areas of southern Lebanon early on Thursday morning targeted Hezbollah weapon depots, missile launchers, and other military sites, the IDF said, as reported by The Times of Israel.
“Among the targets struck were weapons storage facilities, missile launchers, and military sites utilized by the Hezbollah terror organization to advance terror attacks against the IDF and the State of Israel,” the IDF said in a statement.
The strikes were the latest in the Israeli military’s campaign against Hezbollah.
There have been frequent airstrikes as the military says the terror group continues to try to rebuild its capabilities, contravening the US-brokered ceasefire in November 2024.
The truce came after more than a year of war along the border.
This included two months of open conflict in which a ground operation in Lebanon’s south was carried out by the IDF as it sought to enable the safe return of some 60,000 displaced residents of northern Israel.
Hezbollah started attacking Israel on 8 October 2023 – a day after Hamas’s invasion of southern Israel, which triggered the war in Gaza.
The ground invasion of southern Lebanon, launched in September 2024, significantly damaged the terror group’s leadership and stripped back its military capabilities.
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Israel and Hezbollah were required to withdraw from southern Lebanon, to be replaced by the Lebanese armed forces.
Israel has left all but five strategic posts along the border, The Times of Israel reports.
The IDF said more than 400 Hezbollah operatives and members of allied terror groups have been killed in strikes since the ceasefire.
The Israeli military says it has struck hundreds of Hezbollah sites, and has carried out over 1,200 raids and other small operations in southern Lebanon.
