Israel, Hezbollah exchange fire across Lebanon border amid concern over Gaza war spillover

News Desk :
Lebanon’s Iranian-backed Hezbollah group said on Saturday it had fired rockets at Israel and its arch-foe said it had struck a “terrorist cell” in retaliation, as top US and EU diplomats visited the region to seek ways to halt spillover from the war.
Shortly after rocket sirens sounded across northern Israel, the Israeli military said that “approximately 40 launches from Lebanon toward the area of Meron in northern Israel were identified.” There were no immediate reports of casualties or damage, report agencies.
Hezbollah said it had hit a key Israeli observation post with 62 rockets as a “preliminary response” to the killing of Hamas’ deputy chief Saleh al-Arouri on Tuesday.
Tensions have been especially high since Arouri was killed by a drone in the southern suburbs of Beirut, a stronghold of Hamas’ Lebanese ally Hezbollah, in an attack widely attributed to Israel.
The head of Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah, said on Friday Lebanon would be “exposed” to more Israeli operations if his group did not respond to the killing.
Israel’s military said it had responded to Saturday’s rocket attack with an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) strike on “the terrorist cell responsible for the launches toward the area of Metula.”
Israeli fighter jets and troops also struck a series of Hezbollah targets in the areas of Ayta ash Shab, Yaroun, and Ramyeh in southern Lebanon, it said, striking a launch post, military sites, and “terrorist infrastructure.”
With much of the territory already reduced to rubble, UN humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths said on Friday that “Gaza has simply become uninhabitable.”
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and the European Union’s senior diplomat Josep Borrell began a new diplomatic push on Friday to stop the spillover from the three-month-old Gaza war into Lebanon, the Israeli-occupied West Bank, and Red Sea shipping lanes.
Israel and Hezbollah often trade fire across the Lebanese border, the West Bank is seething with emotion and the Iran-aligned Houthis in Yemen seem determined to continue attacks on Red Sea shipping lanes until Israel stops bombarding Gaza. On Saturday, the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said at least 22,722 people had been killed in the besieged Palestinian territory since war with Israel erupted on October 7.
The ministry said in a statement that it had recorded 122 deaths over the past 24 hours, while a total of 58,166 people had been wounded in the Gaza Strip in nearly three months of fighting.
There has been no let-up in the conflict despite several trips to the region by Blinken and other senior diplomats.
The official Palestinian WAFA news agency reported on Saturday that 18 Palestinians were killed by an Israeli attack on a house east of Khan Younis in Gaza.
And in the West Bank village of Beit Rima, the Palestinian health ministry said a 17-year-old was shot dead by Israeli forces and four other people were injured.