A Hamas leader, his wife and their two daughters have been killed in an Israeli strike on northern Lebanon, the Palestinian armed group says, as Israeli air raids continue against the Lebanese armed group Hezbollah in the southern suburbs of Beirut.
Commander Saeed Attallah Ali and his family were killed on Saturday in the “Zionist bombardment of his house in the Beddawi camp” near the northern city of Tripoli, Hamas said, the first time the area had been hit since the start of the Gaza war nearly a year ago.
Ali has been identified as a leader of Hamas’s armed wing, the Qassam Brigades.
Israel has repeatedly targeted Hamas officials in Lebanon in recent weeks, killing several of the most senior leaders of the group. Hamas said 18 of its senior commanders have been killed in recent weeks.
Israel’s military did not immediately comment on the strike near the port city of Tripoli.
Israel has been sharply expanding its attacks on Lebanon after nearly a year of exchanging fire with Hezbollah. Fighting had been mostly limited to the Israel-Lebanon border area, taking place in parallel with Israel’s war in Gaza against Hamas.
Early on Saturday, explosions were also heard across Beirut’s southern suburbs. Residents in the Dahiyeh neighbourhood were reportedly warned by Israel shortly before the attacks, but it was unclear how many of the civilians managed to escape.
On Friday, Israel said it had targeted Hezbollah’s intelligence headquarters in the southern suburbs and was assessing the damage after a series of attacks on senior figures in the group.
Israel has eliminated much of Hezbollah’s senior military leadership, including its secretary-general Hassan Nasrallah in an air attack on September 27.
Al Jazeera’s Ali Hashem, reporting from Beirut, said an area near Beirut’s Rafic Hariri International Airport was also hit.
“It was a busy night just like the several previous nights of bombardments,” Hashem said.
“For now, there’s been no word from Hezbollah about the latest attack and the fate of the head of its executive council.”
There were no immediate reports on casualties from the Hezbollah stronghold.
The Israeli military said Saturday that its forces struck Hezbollah fighters overnight inside a mosque adjacent to the Salah Ghandour Hospital in southern Lebanon that it claimed was a “command centre” used by Hezbollah to launch attacks.
The Salah Ghandour Hospital in Bint Jbeil, which is run by the Hezbollah-affiliated Islamic Health Committee, said nine of its medical and nursing staff were wounded, most of them seriously, after it received an Israeli warning to evacuate.
Hezbollah said early on Saturday that its fighters were engaged in fighting with Israeli soldiers in southern Lebanon and its fighters hit an Israeli tank with a missile near the border.
Hezbollah also said it launched Fadi-1 rockets on Saturday at Israel’s Ramat David Airbase near the northern city of Haifa, about 45km (30 miles) from the Lebanese border.
Lebanon’s death toll exceeds 2,000
On Friday, the Lebanese Ministry of Public Health said more than 2,000 people have been killed by Israeli attacks in the country in the past year, most in the past two weeks.
The Lebanese government has accused Israel of targeting civilians, pointing to dozens of women and children killed.
Attacks on medical teams and facilities – including the Lebanese Red Cross, Lebanese public hospitals and rescue workers affiliated with Hezbollah – have also increased.
Because of the Israeli attacks, more than 1.2 million Lebanese have been forced from their homes, the government said.
The United Nations said most shelters for displaced people in Lebanon are full. Many had gone north to Tripoli or to neighbouring Syria, but an attack on Friday closed the main border crossing between Lebanon and Syria.
UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric called the toll on Lebanese civilians “totally unacceptable”.
The UN peacekeeping force in Lebanon said on Saturday that it would not leave positions in the south despite what it said was an Israeli request to “relocate”.
“On September 30, the [Israeli military] notified UNIFIL of their intention to undertake limited ground incursions into Lebanon. They also requested we relocate from some of our positions,” the UN Interim Force in Lebanon said.
“Peacekeepers remain in all positions and the UN flag continues to fly.
“We are regularly adjusting our posture and activities, and we have contingency plans ready to activate if absolutely necessary,” it added.
A South Korean military transport aircraft returned 97 citizens and family members from Lebanon on Saturday, its Ministry of Foreign Affairs said.