Smoke rises from the site of an Israeli attack against the southern Lebanese village of Yohmor al-Shakif on March 22, 2025. (Credit: Rabih Daher/AFP)
BEIRUT — Israel intensified its attacks against southern Lebanese villages on Saturday killing at least eight people, including a young girl. The escalation followed the Israeli army's announcement Saturday morning that it intercepted three rockets fired from Lebanese territory that triggered sirens in Metula, opposite the Lebanese village of Odaisseh.
Shortly after, the Israeli army fired on the border village of Yohmor al-Shakif (Nabatieh district), followed by a statement from Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz saying he had instructed the Israeli army to "respond accordingly."
By 11 a.m. the Israeli army had targeted five more Lebanese border villages with artillery fire and machine guns including Arnoun and Khiam, both in Nabatieh district, and Hula, Markaba and Kfar Kila, in Marjayoun district, and by early afternoon the Israeli army had bombed 18 more sites in southern Lebanon.
Hezbollah denied "any involvement" in the rockets fired from southern Lebanon and accused Israel of using it as a "pretext" to continue its attacks on Lebanon "which have not ceased since the announcement of the cease-fire” on Nov. 27, 2024. While accusing Hezbollah of violating the cease-fire, Israel has violated its hundreds of times, killing more than 100 people since signing the agreement and razing entire villages to the ground.
“Hezbollah reaffirms its commitment to the cease-fire agreement and assures that it stands behind the Lebanese state in confronting this dangerous Zionist escalation against Lebanon,” Hezbollah's statement reads.
By mid-afternoon, responsibility for the attacks still had not been claimed by any group in Lebanon. A source from the Lebanese Army told Al-Arabiya al-Jadeed that the military was patrolling the area where the rockets were supposedly launched from and investigating into the circumstances surrounding the attack against Israel.
The Lebanese Army later announced that it had found three homemade rocket launchers in an area near Arnoun, north of the Litani River, around six kilometers from the Israeli border, and “dismantled them.” Artillery and machine gun fire was in several areas on Saturday morning, notably in Arnoun and the eastern part of the border zone, in the Marjayoun district.
Casualties and consequences
Dozens of air raids targeted several areas north and south of the Litani River, in the districts of Jezzine, Saida, Nabatieh, Hasbaya, Bint Jbeil and Sour. These strikes killed at least four people in Touline, in the Nabatieh district, according to the village’s mayor and the Ministry of Health reported two deaths in Touline, including a young girl. The victims were a Syrian man at a local gas station and his daughter. The Health Ministry also reported eight injuries in Touline and one person wounded in Yohmor al-Shakif, in the same region.
The Israeli government has had difficulty convincing displaced residents of the north to return home following the cease-fire and local municipal leaders often criticized the Israeli government for failing to secure their safety. "We promised the Galilee communities security — and that is exactly what will happen," Katz declared in his statement. Around 60,000 people fled northern Israel and only a portion have returned, while in Lebanon, over one million people fled the South, with around 100,000 still displaced, according to the U.N.
In his statement, Katz also laid responsibility for any attacks launched from Lebanese territory on the Lebanese government.
The Lebanese government, for its part, has warned entreatingly against the situation spiralling out of control. Prime Minister Nawaf Salam released a statement urging for calm along the border and calling on the Defense Ministry and the U.N. to collaborate with him in trying to thwart another outbreak of violence, saying that it "risks dragging the country into a new war, which would be disastrous for Lebanon and the Lebanese.”
Salam communicated with Defense Minister Michel Menassa on the need to take all necessary security and military measures to ensure that “only the State has the power to decide on war and peace," and with U.N. coordinator in Lebanon, Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert, asking that the U.N. “redouble its international pressure on Israel to withdraw completely from the occupied Lebanese territories," citing U.N. Resolution 1701 and Israel's ongoing violation of its terms through this occupation.
UNIFIL expressed concern over a “possible escalation,” while President Joseph Aoun condemned what he called Israel’s “continued aggression” and accused it of attempting to “drag Lebanon back into the spiral of violence.”
UNIFIL spokesperson Andrea Tenenti urged all parties to “refrain from actions that could compromise recent progress, especially in light of the ongoing threat to civilian lives and the region’s fragile stability.” Any new escalation could have “grave consequences,” he said.
