Israeli air strike kills 9 in Beirut as invasion of Lebanon broadens

Residents of more than 20 towns in southern Lebanon told to evacuate

BEIRUT - The Israeli military issued evacuation warnings on Oct 3 for a further swathe of towns and villages in southern Lebanon, where its troops are fighting Hezbollah militants, as Lebanese health officials raised the death toll from an Israeli strike near the heart of Beirut to at least nine people.

No apparent warning preceded the overnight strike, which hit the Bachoura neighbourhood of Beirut, the Lebanese capital, several hundred yards from Parliament and Western embassies.

Other large explosions were heard in or near the city early on Oct 3 as Israel continued its campaign against Hezbollah, including in the Dahiya, a cluster of neighbourhoods on the southern outskirts of Beirut where Hezbollah holds sway.

“Another sleepless night in Beirut. Counting the blasts shaking the city. No warning sirens. Not knowing what is next. Only that uncertainty lies ahead. Anxiety and fear are omnipresent,” UN special coordinator in Lebanon Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert said on social media platform X.

A Hezbollah-linked civil defence group said seven of its employees, including two medics, were killed in Beirut.

Lebanon's health minister, meanwhile, said more than 40 rescuers and firefighters were killed by Israeli fire over the previous three days.

The Israeli military, on the other hand, said it hit Hezbollah's intelligence headquarters in Beirut, “including terror operatives belonging to the unit, intelligence-gathering means, command centres and additional terrorist infrastructure”.

The attack on Beirut followed a day of clashes between Israeli troops and Hezbollah in southern Lebanon, in what appeared to be the first direct confrontations between the two sides since the invasion began.

Israel said eight of its soldiers had been killed, including five members of an elite unit, as its forces engaged in close-range combat with the Iran-backed militant group.