Hezbollah says it has targeted spying equipment at the Israeli site of Jal e-Alam, opposite the Lebanese village of Naqoura.
Hezbollah says it targeted the Israeli Hadeb Yaroun site at 5:20 p.m.
It also attacked the Rouissat al-Alam site in the disputed Kfar Shuba hills at 5 p.m.
Hezbollah has announced the death of one of its fighters: Hussein Ibrahim Kassab, born in 1989 and originally from Tayr Debba in southern Lebanon.
According to our correspondent, the victim was killed in an Israeli drone strike on a motorcycle in Kadmous, north of Sour.
The Israeli army claimed to have eliminated the man, saying he was a commander in the al-Radwan force, Hezbollah's elite unit.
Israeli warplanes have fired two rockets at a house in Aitaroun (Bint Jbeil caza), according to local residents.
Hezbollah targeted the Israeli Samaka site in the disputed Kfar Shuba hills at 5 p.m.
Israeli artillery fire has targeted the outskirts of Taibeh and Rab al-Talatine (Marjayoun) with artillery and phosphorus shells, causing fires in the targeted areas, residents reported.
Activist and treasurer of the municipality of Kfar Hammam (Hasbaya), Hassib Abdel Hamid, has called on Lebanese officials and concerned parties to support the Civil Defense teams who have been working for the past three hours to extinguish the fires that broke out in the village's forests following the air strike on Kfar Hamam.
"Seven Civil Defense vehicles, along with volunteers from Hasbaya, Rashaya al-Foukhar, Arqoub and Hebbarieh and rescuers from the Islamic Health Committee (affiliated to Hezbollah), have been battling for three hours to bring the fire under control. In addition, 20 volunteers from Kfar Hammam provided assistance, but additional resources are needed as the fire continues to spread due to the wind."
He added that the fire was currently surrounding five houses on the outskirts of the village and that they had been unable to reach this area. He also reported that the fire had ravaged large areas of fig, olive, pine and oak trees in private and public properties located in the village forests.
Fourteen fire crews and six aircraft were deployed this afternoon to extinguish the multiple fires that broke out in the Upper Galilee, in northern Israel, following Hezbollah fire from southern Lebanon, according to Haaretz.
Personnel, with the help of various local security brigades, were able to bring most of the fires in the area under control. According to the commander of the Upper Galilee fire station, Eli Moe, "sirens could be heard throughout the region" as personnel worked to extinguish the fire.
Israeli artillery fire has targeted the disputed Kfar Shuba heights, residents tell our correspondent.
Damage caused by the Israeli strike on the village of Kfour, in the Nabatieh district, south Lebanon, on Aug. 17 2024. (Credi: Mohammad Yassine)
According to a relative of the Syrian family (a woman, her husband and two children) killed in the Israeli strike overnight on Kfour, the mother fled Homs in 2012 because of the war and married in Lebanon.
Her children were aged four and one-and-a-half, the relative told our reporter Lyana Alameddine.
Medical and security sources, as well as relatives of the victims of the Israeli strike on Kfour, have reported that the funerals of four victims (a man, his wife and their two children) will take place this afternoon in Blatt (Marjayoun).
The other six victims will be buried in Syria.
A source following the situation regarding the Syrian family's burial mentioned that an initial request to bury the victims in Houmin Fawqa rather than Blatt had been made to avoid having to obtain travel permits for foreigners among the Lebanese army's intelligence services in the border region south of the Litani River. However, after the municipality of Houmin refused, the village of Blatt was chosen as the burial site.
The New Arab reports that a "technical" Israeli delegation was in Cairo today to discuss an American proposal to reopen the Rafah crossing between Egypt and Gaza.
The delegation, which does not include any high-ranking officials, will meet representatives of Egypt, Qatar and the United States, the three mediators in charge of talks on a truce agreement in Gaza.
According to London-based Qatari media, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has rejected an Egyptian and American plan to monitor the crossing, as he requires Israel play an oversight role in supervising security.
The Palestinian news agency Wafa reports that Palestinian Authority Minister Majid Ramadan has announced a vast polio vaccination campaign for children under 10 in the Gaza Strip, which will begin in the next few days.
Wafa explains that this initiative will be carried out in collaboration with UNRWA, Unicef and the World Health Organization.
According to Ramadan, the first phase will include 1.2 million doses of type 2 polio vaccine, with a further 400,000 doses currently being procured.
Hamas's armed wing, the al-Qassam Brigades, says on Telegram that its fighters "detonated two anti-personnel devices in two enemy pockets and confronted soldiers with machine guns."
They also reported that the attacks left soldiers dead and wounded near the university college in the Tal al-Hawa neighborhood of southern Gaza.
According to the text, the fighters witnessed the landing of a medical evacuation helicopter.
Gaza's Palestinian Civil Defense has appealed to the United Nations to put pressure on Israel to halt the repeated mass displacement of people in the enclave.
The appeal comes after Israel issued several new evacuation orders, covering swathes of the northern and central Gaza Strip, in the space of a few days, further reducing the territory's "humanitarian zone."
In a statement, the Civil Defense said the latest evacuation orders in central Gaza had affected more than 450,000 people, "reopening their wounds."
"We call on the United Nations and the International Court of Justice to intervene to put an end to this policy," the statement said, asserting that it "violates humanitarian law."
An Israeli drone has raided a house at the intersection of Debel-Ramaya-Kuzah (Bint Jbeil), according to residents.
Here are the latest developments in south Lebanon:
* Israeli warplanes targeted a house in Markaba (Marjayoun), according to residents.
* Israeli warplanes attacked the village of Kfar Hammam (Hasbaya). Ambulances were dispatched to the scene.
The Israeli army says that the person killed earlier today by a strike on the Sour area was Hussein Ibrahim Kasseb, commander of the al-Radwan force, Hezbollah's elite unit.
Its Arabic-speaking spokesman, Avichay Adraee, made the claim in a post on X.
One person was killed earlier today in an Israeli drone strike on a motorcycle in Kadmous, north of Sour.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sissi has warned of the "vicious and dangerous circle of instability" that the continuing conflict in Gaza threatens to unleash on the region, as he received French diplomatic chief Stephane Sejourne in Cairo, his office said.
"We must seize the opportunity offered by the current negotiations" for a cease-fire in Gaza, "to reach an agreement that will put an end to the bloodshed," said Sissi, according to a statement from the Egyptian presidency.
Sejourne reportedly informed his interlocutor of "French efforts to reduce regional tensions."
Update from south Lebanon:
* A house has been targeted by an Israeli drone in the village of Ramaya (Bint Jbeil), residents told our correspondent.
* Israeli artillery dropped incendiary bombs on the Khiam plain (Marjayoun), according to local residents.
U.S. President Joe Biden is seeking a cease-fire in Gaza and an agreement on the release of hostages by the end of next week, while trying to dissuade Iran and Hezbollah from carrying out an attack on Israel that could jeopardize this effort, Axios reports citing U.S. officials.
"To say that we are approaching a truce agreement is an illusion," said a senior Hamas official, after U.S. President Joe Biden claimed yesterday that a cease-fire agreement had "never been so close."
"We are not faced with an agreement or real negotiations, but rather with the imposition of American diktats," Sami Abou Zohri, a member of the Palestinian movement's political bureau, said in a statement to AFP, castigating "a huge step backwards" during talks on Thursday and Friday in Doha between the mediating countries — the United States, Qatar and Egypt — and the Israelis.
The Health Ministry of the Hamas government in the Gaza Strip has announced a new death toll of 40,074 in the Palestinian territory since the start of the war, according to AFP.
At least 69 people have been killed in the last 48 hours, said the ministry, which does not usually give a death toll on Fridays, adding that 92,537 people have been wounded in the Gaza Strip since Oct. 7.
The Lebanese Health Ministry has confirmed the death toll from the Israeli strike on a motorcycle in Kadmous, north of Sour, saying that one person was killed.
Israel's latest evacuation orders have pushed thousands more families from their homes and further reduced Gaza's declared "humanitarian zone," according to the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA).
The "humanitarian zone" now covers just 11 percent of the war-torn enclave, according to the U.N. agency, and displaced people are left in "chaos and fear."
Israel issued two new evacuation orders today, calling on residents of many neighborhoods in the north and center of the Gaza Strip to flee immediately.
Numerous projectiles have been intercepted in northern Israel, according to Israeli media and images verified by Sanad, Al Jazeera's fact-checking agency.
These projectiles or fragments triggered a fire in the Biriya forest in Israel, and power cuts have occurred in the towns of Safed and HaGlilit, the Israeli news site Ynet reports.
Israel has broken the sound barrier over the Western Bekaa and Nabatieh (South Lebanon), our correspondents Sarah Abdallah and Muntasser Abdallah report.
⚡The person wounded by an Israeli strike on a motorcycle in the Kadmous area, north of Sour, has died, our correspondent in the area reports.
⚡ Arabic-speaking Israeli army spokesman Avichay Adraee says two soldiers have been wounded by rocket fire from southern Lebanon towards northern Israel.
"Earlier today, one [Israeli army] soldier was seriously wounded and another slightly when a rocket fired from Lebanon fell in the Misgav Am area," he said on X, noting that both men were hospitalized.
Commenting on the sounding of alarm sirens in the Ayelet Hashachar area, the army spokesman said that "around 55 rockets were fired from Lebanon, some of which landed in open areas, without causing any injuries."
"As a result of these strikes, fires broke out in the area, and firefighters have been working to extinguish them," he added.
Hezbollah claims it bombed the Israeli site of Ayelet Hashahar for the first time, using Katyusha missiles, in response to the Israeli strike on Kfour during the night, which killed at least 10 people.
Hezbollah says it targeted an Israeli military position at the Marj site in the Hounin Valley, opposite the southern Lebanese town of Markaba (Marjayoun district), at 11:15 a.m., "causing deaths and injuries."
One person has been seriously injured in Sour after an Israeli drone carried out a strike targeting a motorcycle in the Kadmous area, our correspondent in the south reports. (Courtesy of Muntasser Abdallah/L'Orient Today)
Firefighting crews are battling flames at over 10 sites in Israel's north after a heavy barrage of rockets launched from Lebanon toward the Upper Galilee region, Haaretz reports.
More than 40 rockets have been fired in the direction of northern Israel, Israeli army radio reports, after local residents were warned to stay close to fallout shelters.
The warning applies to residents of the Israeli communities of Hulata, Yesud HaMa'ala, Sde Eliezer, Ayelet Hashachar, Gadot, Mishmar HaYarden and Machanayim.
⚡ Hezbollah says it has bombed the Israeli site of Ayelet Hashahar for the first time, in response to the Israeli strike that targeted Kfour overnight and killed at least people.
Two men inspect the damage caused by the Israeli strike on the village of Kfour, in the Nabatieh district, south Lebanon, on Aug. 17, 2024.
Image credit: Mohammad Yassine
"The Israeli army is expanding its operations in central Gaza," reports Tarek Abu Azzam, Al Jazeera's correspondent in Deir al-Balah in the center of the enclave.
"It has just issued new evacuation orders for residents of the Maghazi refugee camp, specifying a number of blocks to be completely emptied. The evacuation orders have been extended to Salah al-Din Street, which is the main road connecting the north and south of the Gaza Strip and even linking the different governorates in the center," Abu Azzam reported.
Families began packing up what they had to flee to Deir al-Balah, which is already overwhelmed with displaced families. The "humanitarian zone" is shrinking. People are now crowded into the western part of Deir al-Balah," he concludes.
⚡ More than 50 rockets were fired around noon today from southern Lebanon in the direction of the Upper Galilee, al-Jazeera reports.
According to Haaretz, alarm sirens were activated in Safed, in northern Israel, and in several neighboring communities.
The Israeli media also reported that two people were injured earlier in the day by an explosion in the community of Margaliot, in the northern Upper Galilee, noting that the Israeli army was ascertaining whether they had been hit by a drone or an anti-tank missile fired from Lebanon.
Dozens of Israelis have gathered outside the homes of ministers and civil servants across the country, demonstrating against the government and demanding a hostage deal, Haaretz reports.
Demonstrators, some blindfolded and others holding placards, lined the road leading to the home of Likud MP Yuli Edelstein, who was on his way to his synagogue. According to Haaretz, Mr. Edelstein, surrounded by two police vehicles and armed security guards, ignored the protesters.
Similar demonstrations took place in front of the homes of far-right Otzma Yehudit minister Yitzhak Wasserlauf, as well as Likud ministers Miri Regev, Idit Silman and Nir Barkat.
The regional council of Upper Galilee, in northern Israel, has asked residents to stay close to protected areas following the Israeli strike overnight that killed 10 people in the southern Lebanese district of Nabatieh.
The council's notice asks residents to avoid gatherings, close public swimming pools and reduce travel in several communities in the region, bordering Lebanon, according to Haaretz.
The Palestinian health officials yesterday reported the first confirmed case of polio in Gaza. The United Nations has called for "humanitarian pauses" in the fighting between Israel and Hamas to vaccinate children.
This is the first case of this infectious disease to be reported in the Palestinian enclave in 25 years.
According to the officials, the infected person "is a 10-month-old baby who had not been vaccinated" in Deir al-Balah, in the central Gaza Strip.
This morning, Israeli artillery fire targeted the outskirts of Maroun al-Ras and Yaroun (Bint Jbeil), as well as the villages of Markaba and Wadi Slouki (Marjayoun).
* Around midnight, Israeli aircraft carried out mock raids on several areas of southern Lebanon, including Iqlim al-Touffah and Nabatieh, and Israeli artillery fire targeted Aita al-Shaab (Bint Jbeil).
* At 1 a.m., shortly before the deadly strike near Nabatieh, artillery fire also targeted Naqoura (Sour).
Hezbollah meanwhile claimed responsibility for a missile strike, carried out at 10:50 p.m., on Israeli artillery platforms in Za'oura, in the south of the occupied Golan, opposite the Lebanese village of Kfar Shuba (Hasbaya).
Prior to this deadly strike overnight, the following incidents were reported by security sources contacted by our correspondent.
* Israeli aircraft fired two missiles at Hanine, in the Bint Jbeil district.
* Artillery fire directed at Khiam (Marjayoun) wounded a local resident, who was hospitalized.
* An Israeli fighter jet targeted a house in Maroun al-Ras (Bint Jbeil). The Israeli army said, according to a post on X by its Arabic-speaking spokesman Avichay Adraee, that it had targeted "Hezbollah military buildings in Hanine and Maroun al-Ras."
Smoke over the site of an Israeli strike between Kfour and Toul, near Nabatieh, south Lebanon. (Photo obtained by our correspondent Muntasser Abdallah)
In Lebanon, the night was marked by Israeli's deadliest strike since October.
Israeli aircraft bombed a building housing Syrian families in an industrial zone between Kfour and Toul, west of Nabatieh, killing at least 10 people, according to medical sources contacted by our correspondent Muntasser Abdallah.
All 10 victims were Syrian nationals. The victims include one woman and two children.
➡️ More details here.
Meanwhile in Gaza, Israeli strikes continue. The Civil Defense in the Gaza says that 15 members of the same family, including three women and nine children, were killed in an Israeli strike last night in the center of the enclave.
All died in an airstrike on "their house and adjacent warehouses in al-Zawayda", said Civil Defense spokesman Mahmoud Bassal, who identified the victims, nine of whom were aged between two and 17, as belonging to the Ajlah family.
The Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, called on mediators to "put pressure" on Hamas, while Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi advocated "direct and effective pressure" on Netanyahu during a telephone conversation with the Qatari prime minister.
Receiving his British and French counterparts, David Lammy and Stéphane Séjourné, in Jerusalem, Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said he expected his allies to "join Israel" in "attacking Iran" if Teheran attacked his country.
However, an agreement has "never been so close," according to U.S. President Joe Biden, who held talks with the Egyptian and Qatari leaders. Biden also called on all parties not to "undermine" the negotiations.
His secretary of state, Antony Blinken, is due to fly to Israel today to seek "to conclude an agreement" on the basis of the new proposal, according to the State Department.
But two Hamas executives told AFP that the movement has rejected Israel's "new conditions."
The United States yesterday presented a revised proposal for a cease-fire agreement in Gaza, after two days of negotiations in Doha, but Hamas immediately rejected Israel's "new conditions," AFP reports.
The mediators — the USA, Qatar and Egypt — announced the resumption of talks next week in Cairo, following the presentation in Doha on Friday of a new compromise for the "implementation" of a cease-fire agreement.
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This is day 316 of the war in the Gaza Strip and the 315th day since Hezbollah opened a "solidarity" front in southern Lebanon.
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