After 12 young people were killed by rocket blaze from Lebanon in the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights on Sunday, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant pledged to “hit the army tight.” He also sparked concerns that the conflict in Gaza will spread.
Iran warned Israel any new defense “adventures” in Lebanon could lead to “unforeseen effects”. American forces, including France, Germany and Britain, condemned the invasion and appealed for calm.
The European Union demanded an impartial investigation into what transpired.
Since the October 7 assault, which declared the start of the war in Gaza and sparked standard fire markets across the Lebanese border, Israel’s military called it” the deadliest attack on Israeli residents.”
Israel blamed Lebanon’s Hezbollah action for firing a Falaq-1 Egyptian jet but the Iran-backed team– which has frequently targeted Jewish military positions– said it had” no connection” to the incident.
But, it claimed that it had fired one of these rockets at an Israeli military goal in the Golan on Saturday.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu returned first from the United States after the rocket blaze in Majdal Shams, whose population is made up of Arabic-speaking Druze. He arrived right away and soon entered a security cabinet meeting, according to his office.
He said” Hezbollah will pay a heavy price” for the attack,” a price it has not paid before”.
Hezbollah” crossed all dark lines,” according to the Israeli foreign government.
Sad goodnight
Later on Sunday, Israel’s military reported hitting Hezbollah targets “both heavy inside Palestinian territory and in southwestern Lebanon.”
A Palestinian security resource reported to AFP that an Israeli drone fired two weapons at Taraiya village in eastern Lebanon, destroying a hangar and a house without injuring anyone.
Hezbollah has claimed that Hamas ‘ cross-border fire is a support for Israeli Islamists who have been battling Israel’s defense in Gaza since October 7 when they have attacked southern Israel.
That attack resulted in the deaths of 1, 197 citizens in Israel, generally residents, according to an AFP tally based on official Jewish numbers.
Extremists also seized 251 captives, 111 of whom are also held hostage in Gaza, including 39 the army says are useless.
Israel’s hostile military strategy in Gaza has killed at least 39, 324 individuals, according to the health department in the Hamas-run place, which does not give details on civil and violent deaths.
The legal defense agency received five fatalities on Sunday in Khan Yunis, a city in southern Gaza, as a result of an Israeli strike that targeted some tents housing displaced Palestinians.
The jet strike on Majdal Shams killed a number of young people, according to local authorities, who were between the ages of 10 and 16 and hit a football field. Israeli authorities said an 11-year-old son was still missing. In a sad funeral procession for many of the dead, thousands of people crowded the city’s streets.
– ‘ Bloodbath’-
Early on Sunday, Gallant visited the field, where a tower was pockmarked by fragmentation.
According to Riad Kahwaji, head of the Institute for Near East and Gulf Military Analysis, the position Hezbollah said it targeted is about 2.4 kilometres ( 1.5 miles ) from the town, putting it “within margin of error” of the inaccurate rockets.
However, he claimed that” the possibility of a misfire” from an Israeli air defense weapon could not be excluded and that an independent inspection should be conducted into the incident.
On Sunday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken declared that Hezbollah was “every sign” that the rocket attack was being orchestrated.
Josep Borrell, the head of the European Union’s foreign policy, blasted the “bloodbath” and added that there should be an “unrequited foreign investigation into this undesirable incident.”
The United Nations urged “maximum restraint”, in a joint statement from their special coordinator for Lebanon, Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert, and UN Interim Force in Lebanon ( UNIFIL ) chief Aroldo Lazaro.
They claimed that intensifying fire exchanges” may ignite a wider firestorm that had engulf the whole region in a catastrophe beyond belief.”
Britain condemned the invasion, when did Germany, whose unusual government urged” great mind”.
Following an Israeli attack that four Hezbollah fighters were killed in southern Lebanon, the militant group announced a burst of retaliatory jet attacks against the Golan and northern Israel.
Lebanon urged” an instant cessation of hostilities on all fronts”, after calling for an “international analysis” into the attack on Majdal Shams.
Egypt, which has been attempting to broker a peace in Gaza with Qatar, warned of the “risks of a fresh battle before starting in Lebanon.”
– The stalemate efforts in Gaza
Nasser Kanani, a spokesman for Iran’s foreign ministry, cautioned that “any naive motion of the Zionist program can lead to the expansion of the range of volatility, insecurity, and war in the region.”
Israel’s Foreign Ministry called the affair in Majdal Shams a “massacre” and accused Hezbollah of intentionally targeting civilians.
Since Israel seized the Golan Heights from Syria in 1967, many residents of the Druze community have refused to accept Israeli citizenship.
Syria denounced Israel’s “false charges” against Hezbollah and said Israel was looking for “pretexts to expand its anger”.
The crime since October has killed at least 527 citizens in Lebanon, according to an AFP count. At least 104 residents are among the dead, with the majority being soldiers.
According to Israel’s troops, 22 troops and 24 civilians have been killed so far in northeastern Israel.
Netanyahu stated in a statement to the American Congress on Wednesday that Israel would “do whatever it had” to safe its northern border.
Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah, claims that his action will prevent international attacks if a ceasefire is struck in Gaza.
Blinken claimed that the best way to stop the Gaza issue from escalating is to “get the ceasefire in Gaza that we’re working so hard on.”
Months of negotiations have failed to reach a resolution, but Iranian state-linked media reported conversations will start on Sunday in Rome.
