Israeli airstrikes kill at least 492 people in Lebanon

By Maayan Lubell and Maya Gebeily, Reuters

Smoke billows from a site targeted by Israeli shelling in the southern Lebanese village of Zaita. Photo: MAHMOUD ZAYYAT/AFP

Israel launched airstrikes against more than a thousand Hezbollah targets on Monday, killing 492 people and sending tens of thousands fleeing for safety in Lebanon's deadliest day in decades, according to authorities.

After some of the heaviest cross-border exchanges of fire since hostilities flared in October, Israel warned people in Lebanon to evacuate areas where it said the armed movement was storing weapons.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sent a short video statement addressed to the Lebanese people.

"Israel's war is not with you, it's with Hezbollah. For too long Hezbollah has been using you as human shields," he said.

Nasser Yassin, the Lebanese minister coordinating the crisis response, told Reuters 89 temporary shelters in schools and other facilities had been activated, with capacity for more than 26,000 people as civilians fled "Israeli atrocities".

After almost a year of war against Hamas in Gaza on its southern border, Israel is shifting its focus to the northern frontier, where Iran-backed Hezbollah has been firing rockets into Israel in support of Hamas, also backed by Iran.

Israel's military said it struck Hezbollah in Lebanon's south, east and north.

Lebanon's health ministry said at least 492 people had been killed, including 24 children and 42 women, and 1,645 wounded. One Lebanese official said it was Lebanon's highest daily death toll from violence since the 1975-1990 civil war.

Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said Monday marked a "significant peak" in the nearly year-long conflict.

"On this day we have taken out of order tens of thousands of rockets and precise munition. What Hezbollah has built over a period of 20 years since the second Lebanon War is in fact being destroyed by the IDF," he said in a statement, referring to the Israeli Defense Forces.

A text message in Arabic calling on people to leave areas risking strikes by the Israel Defence Forces. Photo: Jaap Arriens/NurPhoto via AFP

More airstrikes expected

On Monday evening Israel launched a strike on Beirut's southern suburbs aimed at senior Hezbollah leader Ali Karaki, the head of the southern front. Hezbollah later said he was safe and had moved to a secure location.

About 60,000 people have been evacuated from northern Israel because of cross-border fighting between Israel and Hezbollah. Gallant said the campaign would continue until the residents had returned to their homes. Hezbollah for its part has vowed to fight until there is a ceasefire in Gaza.

The Israeli military said it struck about 1300 Hezbollah targets in Lebanon. There were many secondary blasts when munitions stored inside buildings exploded, Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said in a statement.

He said Israeli strikes hit long-range cruise missiles, heavyweight rockets, short-range rockets and explosive drones.

In response to the strikes, Hezbollah said it launched dozens of missiles at a military base in northern Israel.

Sirens warning of Hezbollah rocket fire sounded across northern Israel, including in the port city of Haifa, and in the northern part of the occupied West Bank, the military said.

More attacks were expected in Lebanon.

Hagari said Hezbollah put weaponry "inside Lebanese villages and civilian homes, and intended to fire them toward civilians in Israel while endangering the Lebanese civilian population."

Hezbollah has not commented on the assertion that it has hidden weapons in houses, which Reuters could not independently verify, but it has said it does not place military infrastructure near civilians.

Strikes put more pressure on Hezbollah

The strikes have redoubled the pressure on Hezbollah, which last week suffered heavy losses when thousands of pagers and walkie-talkies used by its members exploded.

The operation was widely blamed on Israel, which has not confirmed nor denied responsibility.

In New York, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said Israel wanted to drag the Middle East into a full-blown war by provoking Iran to join the Israel-Hezbollah conflict.

"It is Israel that seeks to create this all-out conflict," he told journalists after his arrival in New York to attend the U.N. General Assembly, saying the consequences of such instability would be irreversible.

The fighting has raised fears that the U.S., Israel's close ally, and Iran will be sucked into a wider war.

Imad Kreidieh, head of Lebanese telecoms company Ogero, said more than 80,000 automated calls asking people to evacuate their areas had been detected on the network.

Lebanese information minister Ziad Makary said his ministry had received an Israeli call with an order to evacuate its building, but that it would not comply. "This is a psychological war," Makary told Reuters.

Suffering from a financial meltdown, Lebanon can ill afford another war like the one that erupted in 2006, when Israel pounded it during a month-long conflict with Hezbollah.

"If Hezbollah carries out a major operation, Israel will respond and destroy more than this," said state employee Joseph Ghafary in the Beirut district of Sassine. "We can't bear it."

Mohammed Sibai, a shopowner in the Beirut neighbourhood of Hamra, said he saw the escalation as "the beginning of the war".

"If they want war, what can we do?" he said. "We cannot do anything."

- Reuters