BEIRUT: Hezbollah said it launched an “aerial attack with an assault drone on the newly established headquarters of the Israeli army’s Western Brigade south of the Ya’ara settlement” on Wednesday that “accurately struck the positions of officers and soldiers.”
The group said the assault was a response to an “Israeli attack on Tuesday night against a truck on the Baalbek-Homs international road.” The truck was reportedly loaded with ammunition and military logistical equipment. One person was “slightly injured” in that attack, the Ministry of Health’s Emergency Center said.
A security source said the vehicle was part of a three-truck convoy but only one was hit by the strike, adding: “The truck caught fire and explosions were heard coming from it.”
Hezbollah imposed a security cordon around the scene of the attack and prevented residents from approaching. Many people living nearby left the area temporarily out of fear for their safety.
Less than 10 hours before the attack on the truck, Hezbollah member Mohammed Hassan Taha, from the city of Baalbek, and three Palestinian members of the Islamic Jihad movement were killed by Israeli forces in a combat-drone strike on their vehicle while they were traveling from Syria to Lebanon. The incident happened on the Damascus-to-Beirut road at a checkpoint near Al-Zabadani junction.
The Israeli army said it “struck Hezbollah targets deep inside Lebanon.” Reconnaissance aircraft and combat drones remain active around the clock each day, hunting for Hezbollah members.
The drone attack that killed Taha was at least the third Israeli assassination of its kind in the area in the past two months. Previous targets have included Yasser Qarnabesh, a former assistant to Hezbollah’s secretary-general, and Syrian businessman Baraa Al-Qaterji.
Further evidence on Wednesday of escalating tensions included at least four Israeli airstrikes that targeted areas on the outskirts of Toumat Niha in Western Bekaa, and the launch of rockets toward the Lebanese border town of Aitaroun. Another town close to the border, Markaba, was reportedly hit by phosphorus bombs.
Israeli shelling also caused fires in olive groves and other agricultural areas in Al-Jabeen and the Tair Harfa triangle. Lebanese Civil Defense teams fought the blazes with support from the Lebanese Armed Forces.
Eleven months of Israeli attacks on southern Lebanon have left dozens of front-line towns scorched, entire neighborhoods razed, more than 110,000 residents displaced, and farmers unable to tend their lands.
Health Ministry figures indicate that the death toll in Lebanon during the conflict between Israeli forces and Hezbollah is at least 564, mostly Hezbollah leaders and members, and 1,848 people have been wounded.
On the Israeli side, 24 soldiers and 26 civilians have been killed and hundreds of people injured, according to media reports.
