At least 1 person killed in Israeli strikes in Hermel | Live

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Lebanon

An Israeli drone strike in Deir Qanoun al-Nahr caused no casualties, reports our correspondent in southern Lebanon. According to the correspondent, the attack took place near the place where Hashem Safieddine, the candidate to succeed Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah, was buried on Monday. Deir Qanoun al-Nahr is Safieddine's native village.

Lebanon

According to the Health Ministry, Israeli strikes in Hermel killed at least one person and injured two others.

Gaza

An internal Israeli army investigation published today has revealed that the unprecedented Hamas-led attack of Oct. 7, 2023, took place in three successive waves and that more than 5,000 people entered Israel from Gaza that day, AFP reports.

“The first wave ... included more than 1,000 terrorists from the Nukhba [Hamas elite unit] who infiltrated under cover of heavy fire,” says a summary of the investigation provided by the army.

It adds that a second wave included 2,000 fighters and that the third wave was characterized by the arrival of hundreds more, as well as several thousand civilians. “In total, around 5,000 terrorists infiltrated Israeli territory during the attack,” says the internal investigation.

Lebanon

The Israeli army said it had carried out an air strike against an “observation post” belonging to Hezbollah in southern Lebanon, calling its presence a “violation of the cease-fire agreement between Israel and Lebanon.”

“Earlier today [Thursday], activities inside an observation post belonging to the Hezbollah terrorist organization were identified in the area of Ainata, in southern Lebanon,” the army said in a statement.

Israeli strikes in Hermel killed two people, reports our correspondent.

Lebanon

After flying over the Bekaa plain at medium altitude, an Israeli drone fired two missiles at a pick-up truck on a secondary road near the Red Crescent in Hermel, then a third missile when people began to gather, according to information from our correspondent in the region, Sarah Abdallah. According to an initial assessment by the Health Ministry, the strike killed one person and wounded another. Three drones continued to fly over the area.

Israeli authorities confirmed the release of 643 Palestinian prisoners in the latest exchange.

Several local media outlets reported heavy gunfire on the old airport road as a funeral procession passed through the area.

Israeli forces killed a young Palestinian during a raid on the Balata refugee camp, east of Nablus in the occupied West Bank, according to security sources cited by the Wafa news agency.

Israeli forces seized the young man's body. Wafa also quoted the director of the Red Crescent emergency and ambulance center in Nablus, Amid Ahmed, as saying that paramedics transferred a 32-year-old man after he was shot in the thigh, while a 14-year-old boy was injured in the hand and abdomen.

Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said Israel would send a delegation to Cairo to assess the possibility of negotiations with Hamas.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made the same announcement, according to The Times of Israel, while Defense Minister Israel Katz recently claimed that Hamas was preparing to resume war, according to comments reported by Ynet.

Israel received the "green light" from the United States to remain in buffer zones in Lebanon and Syria "without time limit," depending on the situation, Defense Minister Israel Katz said Thursday, speaking at a conference with municipal leaders in the region.

Katz said the new Syrian regime "tried for the first time to occupy positions and outposts," adding that "our air force struck and struck them."

Israel is seeking to maintain ties with Syria's Druze community and is considering allowing those living nearby to work daily in the Golan Heights, he said.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pledged Thursday to "work tirelessly" to bring back all the hostages from Gaza, after Hamas returned the bodies of four hostages who were taken during the Palestinian Islamist movement's Oct. 7 attack.

"I pledge that we will continue to work tirelessly until everyone returns. Until all our sons and daughters return home," Netanyahu said in a statement from his office.

The Lebanese army is destroying unexploded Israeli munitions in the Mashghara plain in western Bekaa, according to L'Orient Today's correspondent.

State Comptroller Matanyahu Englman said that outgoing Israeli military Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi and Shin Bet Director Ronen Bar were preventing his office from conducting an audit "on the main failure" of the organizations' handling of the Oct. 7 Hamas attack, according to comments reported by Haaretz.

Speaking at a convention on Thursday, Englman outlined a series of investigations by his office into failures before and during the attack.

“I expect the attorney general to issue instructions to all parties involved to cooperate in accordance with the law,” he said.

According to the Gazan Health Ministry, 48,365 people have been killed by Israeli bombardments during the more than 15-month war between Israel and Hamas, with 111,780 injured.

The ministry reported 17 dead and 19 new injured in the last 48 hours and repeated that other victims are still under the rubble.

The telecoms company Alfa announced on Thursday that it had restored to service five exchanges in south Lebanon located on the Lebanese-Israeli border and damaged during the conflict between Hezbollah and Israel.

Find the details here.

(Photo relayed by our correspondent Muntasser Abdallah)

A billboard with a photo of the former secretary-general of Hezbollah and the speaker of parliament and leader of the Amal Movement was erected in south Lebanon, at a point quite close to the Israeli town of Metula, on the other side of the border with Lebanon, according to L'Orient Today's correspondent in south Lebanon.

The montage is accompanied by a message praising the tenacity of the resistance during the battle of Khiam, a town in Marjayoun that was stormed for about two weeks by Israel without allowing its soldiers to take up positions there before the ceasefire came into effect. "Thanks to the blood of your men, Khiam has remained a fortress against the enemies," the sign read.

According to L'Orient Today's correspondent, the message of thanks is specifically addressed to members of Hezbollah's Radwan Force and the Shamran Unit of the Amal Movement.

A photo taken on July 20, 2018 in the Golan Heights shows an Israeli Merkava tank taking up position on the border between Israel and Syria. (Credit: Jalaa Marey/AFP)

On Tuesday night, Israel carried out a series of airstrikes in southern Syria. Is Tel Aviv trying to keep the south of Syria divided and unstable, at a time of political transition in Damascus? L'Orient Today provides some answers here.

Photo published on the Lebanese army's X account

The Lebanese army announced on Wednesday that it discovered and dismantled two Israeli surveillance devices placed in south Lebanon, without giving further details on the locations where these objects were found. The devices, equipped with cameras and motion sensors, were camouflaged in a tree trunk and a stone, according to images broadcast by the troops on X.

Read the full story here.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said in a statement that three of the hostages whose bodies were returned overnight by Hamas had "been murdered" in captivity, AFP reports.

"Based on intelligence and information in our possession, Ohad (Yahalomi), Tsachi (Idan) and (Itzik Elgarat) were murdered while in captivity in Gaza," Netanyahu's office said in a statement.

The fourth body returned overnight was identified as that of Shlomo Mansour, who Israel had announced on Feb. 11 had been killed on Oct. 7, 2023, before his body was taken to Gaza.

Haaretz reported that Israeli police and the Shin Bet arrested a 26-year-old resident of Petah Tikva in Israel on suspicion of acting on behalf of an Iranian agent.

In a statement, authorities said the suspect had been in contact with the Iranian agent for several months and, under his direction, had carried out "dozens of graffiti painting operations in the Petah Tikva and Rosh HaAyin areas in exchange for payment."

According to an Israeli investigation, he was also "asked to photograph the home of Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar and military bases, and even asked if he knew any Israeli Air Force pilots, but he did not carry out these missions."

Speaking from Naqoura (Sour) at a memorial service for party members killed in the war against Israel, Hezbollah MP Hussein Jashi said Israel had failed to achieve its war goal of creating a buffer zone in southern Lebanon, extending well beyond the Lebanese-Israeli border. This is an argument that the party has repeatedly said.

"Our presence today in Naqoura confirms the enemy's failure to achieve its stated objective, as one of the objectives of the war launched by the Zionist enemy against Lebanon on Sept. 23 was to establish a security buffer zone along the border, including the frontline villages and towns, including the city of Naqoura," he said, estimating that the Israeli army had mobilized "more than 70,000 soldiers and officers" in its offensive.

He also stated that the Lebanese state should stand firm in the face of Israeli aggression and insist that France and the United States, under whose auspices the ceasefire that came into force on Nov. 27 was negotiated, put pressure on Israel. He added that "the Lebanese state has a real opportunity to confirm in practice that it assumes the responsibility it has taken to expel the occupier from all Lebanese territories and to rebuild what the Zionist enemy destroyed."

Israel still occupies five positions in south Lebanon.

Israeli President Isaac Herzog stressed on Thursday the "moral obligation" of his country's authorities to do everything in our power to bring back all hostages still held in Gaza, both the dead and the living, after the return to Israel of four hostage bodies from Oct. 7.

"The return from captivity of the bodies of our brothers underscores our moral obligation to do everything in our power to bring back all hostages, the living to their loving families, and the dead to be buried," Herzog wrote on X.

The Israeli Hostage Families Forum announced the death of Tsachi Idan on Thursday morning, confirming the identities of the four hostage bodies returned overnight in exchange for the release of Palestinians held by Israel.

"We received with great sadness the news of the identification of Shlomo Mansour, Tsachi Idan, Itzik Elgarat, and Ohad Yahalomi," the Families Forum wrote in a statement. Tsachi Idan, a 49-year-old engineer and developer who lived in Kibbutz Nahal Oz, was taken to Gaza by Hamas with his hands covered in the blood of his daughter Maayan Idan, 18, who was shot dead in front of him during the attack by the Palestinian Islamist movement on Oct. 7, 2023.

French President Emmanuel Macron said he shared the "immense pain" of the family of Franco-Israeli hostage Ohad Yahalomi, whose death was announced Thursday, and said that "the barbarity of Hamas must end."

"France lost fifty of its children in the infamy of Oct. 7," Emmanuel Macron wrote on X, above a photo of the hostage who was 49 when he was kidnapped by the Palestinian Islamist movement.

The United States on Wednesday imposed sanctions on six Hong Kong and China-based entities accused of involvement in an Iranian drone procurement network, as the Trump administration implements its "maximum pressure" campaign against Tehran, Reuters reports.

The U.S. Treasury Department said the entities were engaged in the procurement of unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) components on behalf of an Iranian company subject to U.S. sanctions, Pishtazan Kavosh Gostar Boshra, and its subsidiary Narin Sepehr Mobin Isatis, adding that the companies were key suppliers to Iran’s unmanned aerial vehicle and ballistic missile programs. Reuters could not immediately reach the PKGB or NSMI for comment.

In the Bekaa, Israeli drones started to fly over the Baalbeck and Hermel areas under, according to L'Orient Today's correspondent.

No security incidents were reported overnight in south Lebanon, apart from the firing of flares by Israel over Naqoura (Sour) and Aita al-Shaab (Bint Jbeil), according to L'Orient Today's correspondent. There was also calm in the Bekaa, according to L'Orient Today's correspondent.

They added that reports of clashes between the new Syrian security forces and Lebanese militants on the border, during which Syrian mortar fire targeted the town of al-Qasr, are false.

The bodies of Itzhak Elgarat, Tsachi Idan, Ohad Yahalomi and Shlomo Mantzur, four Israelis taken hostage by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023 and killed in captivity, were returned to Israel on Wednesday night, according to Haaretz.

The Palestinian Prisoners' Information Office said Thursday morning that a total of 642 prisoners were released from Israeli jails overnight as part of the seventh exchange of the Gaza cease-fire.

Among the released prisoners were 445 Gazans arrested following the Oct. 7 Hamas attack, including 46 women and minors. Their release was scheduled for Saturday and was delayed by Israel.

Hamas said Thursday that Israel had "no choice" but to begin negotiations for the second phase of the cease-fire in Gaza, as the first phase expires Saturday.

"It has no choice but to begin negotiations for the second phase," the Palestinian Islamist movement said in a statement on Telegram, after a final exchange of hostages and prisoners on Wednesday evening, assuring that it had ensured that Israel could not have "false excuses" to derail the process.

The Palestinian movement also said it was ready to extend the first phase of the cease-fire agreement with Israel but has not yet received a concrete proposal to do so, a spokesperson told Qatari television channel Al-Araby TV.

They also said that Hamas had not received any new proposals and that it remained open to extending or accelerating the process in accordance with the red lines it has set for itself: An end to the war, Israel's complete withdrawal, a dignified prisoner exchange and the start of the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip. He added that the group was "open to any Arab or international proposal aimed at improving the lives of civilians and rebuilding the Gaza Strip."

Be sure to read the Morning Brief so you are caught up with what has been happening.

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