Israel carried out its heaviest strikes in Lebanon since the start of the conflict with Hezbollah last month, killing more than 250 people on this Wednesday (the 9th), even as the Iran-aligned group halted its attacks under a two-week ceasefire between the United States and Iran.
The bombardments cast doubt on efforts toward a regional truce, with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian stating that a ceasefire in Lebanon was an essential condition of the agreement reached between Tehran and Washington.
In the afternoon of this Wednesday, at least five consecutive strikes rocked the capital Beirut, sending plumes of smoke over the city, while the Israeli military said it had carried out the largest coordinated attack of the war. More than 100 Hezbollah command centers and military facilities were hit in Beirut, the Beqaa Valley and southern Lebanon within ten minutes, according to Israel.
The Lebanese Civil Defense service said 254 people were killed and more than 1,100 wounded across the country. The greatest number of deaths was recorded in Beirut, with 91 victims. The Ministry of Health, for its part, released a toll of 182 dead across Lebanon and stressed that the figure is not final yet.
This was the deadliest day since the war began on March 2, when Hezbollah began firing at Israel in support of the Iranian government after a joint US and Israeli attack on Iran two days earlier. In response, Israel launched a large-scale aerial and ground campaign.
Reporters from Reuters saw civil defense teams using a crane to rescue an elderly woman from a building in the western part of Beirut. Half of the building had been destroyed in an Israeli attack, leaving residents on the upper floors trapped.
Earlier, reporters said people on motorcycles were taking the wounded to hospitals due to a shortage of ambulances. One of Beirut’s largest medical centers said it needed blood donations of all types.
“The scale of killing and destruction in Lebanon today is simply horrific,” said the UN human rights chief, Volker Türk. “So much carnage, just hours after the ceasefire agreement with Iran, defies comprehension.”
On Wednesday night, an attack hit the southern suburbs of Beirut, according to live Reuters footage.
Israel and the US say Lebanon is not included in the ceasefire
In a televised address, the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, stated that Lebanon is not part of the ceasefire with Iran and that the Israeli military would continue to strike Hezbollah “with force.”
The White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, and the US vice president, JD Vance, also said on Wednesday that Lebanon is not included in the ceasefire.
“I think this is the result of a legitimate misunderstanding. I believe the Iranians thought the ceasefire included Lebanon, but it did not,” Vance told reporters in Budapest.
Earlier, the prime minister of Pakistan, Shehbaz Sharif, a key intermediary in the negotiations for a ceasefire between the US and Iran, had said that the truce would include Lebanon.
In a statement, Hezbollah condemned what it called Israel’s “barbaric aggression” and said that the attacks strengthen the group’s right to respond.
The Hezbollah halted attacks against Israeli targets early Wednesday, three Lebanese sources close to the group told Reuters. The last public statement from Hezbollah about its military activity had been released in the early hours of the morning, reporting that it had attacked Israeli troops inside Lebanon on Tuesday night.
“Hezbollah was informed that it was part of the ceasefire — so we complied, but Israel, as always, violated it and carried out massacres across Lebanon,” said to Reuters the group’s senior parliamentarian, Ibrahim al-Moussawi.
Another Hezbollah parliamentarian, Hassan Fadlallah, said there would be “repercussions for the entire agreement” if Israeli attacks continued.
The Iranian Revolutionary Guard warned the US and Israel that it would deliver a “response that will cause regret” if the attacks on Lebanon did not cease.
The Lebanese president, Joseph Aoun, condemned the Wednesday bombardments and said that French President Emmanuel Macron had stated he was willing to exert diplomatic pressure to include Lebanon in any ceasefire.
The majority of Wednesday’s attacks occurred in civilian areas, according to Lebanese authorities. Hours before the bombings, Israeli forces had issued warnings to some neighborhoods in southern Beirut and southern Lebanon. No warning was given for the central area of the capital, which was also struck.
Containment Zone
Following the strikes, Israeli military spokesman Avichay Adraee said in a post on X (formerly Twitter) that Hezbollah had left its Shiite stronghold in the Dahiyeh district in southern Beirut and moved to areas with mixed religious populations in other parts of the country.
He said Israeli forces would pursue Hezbollah “wherever it is.”
The Israeli army said it had targeted a Hezbollah commander in Beirut, without providing further details.
Israel also hit, on Wednesday, the last bridge linking southern Lebanon to the rest of the country, according to a senior Lebanese security official. The structure crossed the Litani River, which flows about 30 kilometers north of the border with Israel.
A spokesman for the Israeli military said the area south of the Litani is “disconnected from Lebanon.”
Israel said it planned to occupy the region as a “containment zone.”
Israel also attacked hospitals and power plants in the area, and thousands of Lebanese civilians who remain there report facing shortages of food and medicines.
