Fresh Israeli airstrikes kill 2, injure 6 in Lebanon

BEIRUT

Two people were killed and six others injured in fresh Israeli airstrikes in Lebanon on Wednesday amid a massive aerial campaign on the country, according to local media.

The state news agency NNA said warplanes hit a house in the town of Hellanieh in Bekaa Valley in eastern Lebanon, killing two people and injuring others.

Six more people were injured in another strike targeting two tractors in the town of Tayr Debba in southern Lebanon, the broadcaster said.

Meanwhile, sirens sounded inside the UN peacekeeping mission's (UNIFIL) headquarters in Naqoura in southern Lebanon, NNA reported.

No details were provided about the cause of the loud sirens.

Israel has mounted massive airstrikes across Lebanon against what it claims Hezbollah targets since Sept. 23, killing more than 1,250 people, injuring 3,618 others, and displacing more than 1.2 million people.

The aerial campaign was an escalation in yearlong cross-border warfare between Israel and Hezbollah since the start of Tel Aviv’s brutal offensive on the Gaza Strip that has killed more than 42,000 people, mostly women and children, since a Hamas attack last year.

At least 2,119 people have since been killed and 10,019 others injured in Israeli attacks in Lebanon, according to Lebanese authorities.

Despite international warnings that the Middle East region was on the brink of a regional war amid Israel’s relentless attacks on Gaza and Lebanon, Tel Aviv expanded the conflict by launching on Oct. 1 a ground invasion into southern Lebanon.

*Writing by Ahmed Asmar