A flurry of Israeli strikes on Thursday has killed at least 32 people in the areas around Lebanon’s Nabatieh District, including women and children, and wounded dozens of others. The casualties largely came from Israeli attacks on residential buildings in southern towns and villages.
As with yesterday, there were high casualty incidents in Jebchit. Today’s attacks hit two distinct residential buildings there, the first killing three and wounding seven, and the second killing four additional people, including a small child.
Just a few miles north, in the village of Toul, Israeli strikes killed four and wounded six others. A second attack later is the day killed another person and wounded three others. The village in between Jebchit and Toul, Harouf, also saw a strike, destroying a house and killing two more people.
White phosphorus munitions strike the residential area of Yohmor | Image from social media
A little further east in the Nabatieh District, in Kfar Roumanne, an Israeli strike on a residential building killed a Lebanese soldier and at least one member of his family. The toll may rise further as the report is recent.
Later in the day, strikes were reported against Zebbedine, killing six, two in Shahbiyah, two in Qana, and two, including a child, in al-Haniyeh. The deputy mayor of Jannata was similarly reported killed in another strike. More strikes were reported in al-Bayada, but the toll was unclear.
Artillery shelling was also reported in the areas of Zawtar al-Sharqiyah, Yohmor al-Shaqif, and Bayt al-Sayyad, The strikes involved phosphorous munitions, though so far there haven’t been additional casualties in those strikes.
Israel has reiterated their evacuation order for villages in the area of Nabatieh, which of course are the areas being most heavily struck today. While presenting the evacuation orders as being about Hezbollah facilities and weapons in those villages, the attacks seem to almost exclusively target civilian homes without any pretense of Hezbollah links.
Hezbollah, for its part, has been retaliating against Israel, with a drone strike killing an Israeli soldier in southern Lebanon and wounding another, and then an additional drone strike targeting Israeli artillery positions in northern Israel wounding 12 others.
The fatal strike was in the village of Qantara, further south from the villages hit by Israel. Israeli troops are positioned inside that village, and two drones targeted them. One was intercepted and the other wasn’t, hitting their position and killing Sgt. Liem ben Hamo. Hezbollah reported the drones were targeting tanks in the area.
The other strike targeted an artillery strike near Shomera, hitting a cargo carrier and starting a fire. This led to multiple artillery shells exploding, which left at least 12 Israeli soldiers wounded.
