Middle East crisis live: IDF carries out ‘targeted strike’ on Beirut after Hezbollah pounded northern Israel with rockets | Lebanon

A Hezbollah source said that “the search was still underway,” when asked if Ibrahim Aqil, a top Hezbollah commander wanted by the US for his alleged role in the 1983 US embassy bombings, was the killed in the Israeli strike.

A Hezbollah source said that “the search was still under way,” when asked if Ibrahim Aqil, a top Hezbollah commander wanted by the US for his alleged role in the 1983 US embassy bombings, was the killed in the Israeli strike.

William Christou in Beirut has the following report:

Israeli jets carried out a strike on southern Beirut on Friday afternoon in what the Israeli military called a “targeted airstrike” in an announcement.

Four rockets targeted the building in Dahieh, Lebanon’s National News Agency (NNA) reported. Ambulances transported those injured from the scene as Lebanon’s civil defence urged citizens to stay home to keep roads clear for emergency workers.

NNA reports that at least five children have been killed in the strike, with more casualties expected as paramedics arrived at the scene. The attack occurred at rush hour, a little before 4 pm.

Videos of the strike showed rubble and burned-out cars strewn across a busy street, as people surrounded a building with smoke billowing out of it. The strike targeted a building near the al-Qaem mosque in the Haret Hreik neighbourhood of south Beirut, a residential area.

Reuters, quoting a Lebanese security source, said that the strike was near a Hezbollah facility.

An Israeli army spokesperson issued a statement, saying it “conducted a precision strike in the Beirut area,” adding that there had been “no change in the home front command’s instructions.”

The strike is the third time Beirut has been hit by an Israeli airstrike since fighting between Hezbollah and Israel started on 8 October after the former launched rockets “in solidarity” with Hamas’s attack the day prior.

It comes two days after a wide-ranging attack targeting walkie-talkies and pagers that injured more than 3,000 and left at least 42 dead. Hezbollah and Lebanon have accused Israel of being behind the attack, but Israel has not commented on the operation.

The Israeli military said it carried out a “targeted strike” in the Lebanese capital Beirut on Friday, according to Reuters.

“The IDF (Israel Defense Forces) conducted a targeted strike in Beirut. At this moment, there are no changes in the home front command defensive guidelines,” the military said, providing no further details.

Israel submitted on Friday formal challenges to the international criminal court (ICC) over its jurisdiction and the legality of arrest warrant requests against Israeli leaders for their conduct of the Gaza war, the foreign ministry said.

Reuters reports that Israel’s filings might further delay a decision on the warrants, requested in May against Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and defence minister Yoav Gallant.

ICC prosecutor Karim Khan last month urged judges to rule on the warrants, sought also against Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar and others in the Palestinian militant group.

The Israeli foreign ministry said that its first legal brief outlined the ICC’s “manifest lack of jurisdiction” in the case. The second paper, it said, argues that the ICC prosecutor breached court rules by “failing to provide Israel with the opportunity to exercise its right to investigate by itself the claims raised by the prosecutor, before proceeding.”

The office of the prosecutor could not immediately be reached by Reuters for comment.

In August, Khan said the court has jurisdiction over any war crimes in occupied Palestinian territories and that rules saying the ICC cannot step in if a country is doing its own genuine investigation do not apply for the warrants sought for Netanyahu and Gallant.

Rowena Mason

David Lammy is scrutinising contingency plans for evacuating remaining Britons from Lebanon, having already urged UK nationals to leave the country amid hostilities with Israel.

The UK foreign secretary will lead meetings in Whitehall on Friday as officials try to avoid a repeat of the chaos in which British people scrambled to leave Afghanistan when the Taliban took over in 2021.

Lammy expressed concern about “rising tensions and civilian casualties” in Lebanon after Israel carried out airstrikes on Hezbollah targets in the south of the country on Thursday.

He repeated the Foreign Office’s warning to British nationals, urging them to leave Lebanon “while commercial options remain” as the situation “could deteriorate rapidly”.

Hezbollah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, has vowed to retaliate after the attacks that targeted Lebanese militants with exploding pagers, killing and injuring many people.

On Thursday evening, Lammy said he had spoken to the Lebanese prime minister, Najib Mikati, and “expressed my deep concern over rising tensions and civilian casualties in Lebanon”.

He said that they had discussed “the need for a negotiated solution to restore stability and security” across the border between Israel and Lebanon.

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Hezbollah pounded northern Israel with 140 rockets today, the Israeli military and the militant group said, the Associated Press reported.