BEIRUT: Fresh Israeli strikes hit Beirut’s southern suburbs and south Lebanon on Tuesday after the Israeli army warned people to evacuate and the United Nations said 100,000 people had been displaced in a single day.
Lebanon was drawn into the Middle East war last week when Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah attacked Israel in response to the killing of Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in US-Israeli strikes.
Israel, which kept up strikes targeting Hezbollah despite a 2024 ceasefire, has since launched waves of attacks across Lebanon and sent ground troops into border areas.
“Israeli warplanes launched a raid... on the southern suburbs” of Beirut, Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency said.
AFPTV footage showed smoke rising from the area, where Hezbollah holds sway, while the Israeli military said it began “striking Hezbollah infrastructure” there.
In Lebanon’s south, the NNA said “the Israeli enemy launched a strike” in Abbassiyeh near Tyre city, after the Israeli military said it would strike a building there and in the coastal city of Sidon.
It also reported strikes in other areas.
Lebanese authorities have said Israel’s attacks since March 2 have killed at least 486 people and wounded more than 1,300 others.
The government has said more than 660,000 people have registered as displaced, with some 120,000 sleeping at official shelters as of Monday.
The United Nations said on Tuesday that among the displaced were more than 100,000 who had fled in just 24 hours.
This is “a faster pace of displacement compared to 2024,” during Israel’s last war with Hezbollah, said Karolina Lindholm Billing, the UN refugee agency’s representative in Lebanon.