Several hurt by Hezbollah fire in north as expected truce deal looms

Hezbollah rocket and drone attacks on northern Israel seriously injured two elderly people and a soldier, and warplanes carried out strikes on the terror group’s Lebanese strongholds, as international efforts to secure a truce between the Iran-backed terror group and Israel appeared to near completion.

With concerns high over the possibility that fighting could ramp up as a ceasefire deal nears, the Israel Defense Forces Home Front Command issued new restrictions in several areas of northern Israel.

The IDF said Monday evening it was putting communities across the Golan Heights and along the northern frontier under “limited activity” rules, tightening them from “partial activity.”

The restrictions bar most schools from opening and also forbid large gatherings in the area.

While near the restive borders with Lebanon and Syria, the Golan Heights has largely been spared the brunt of rocket fire on northern Israel, though a Hezbollah rocket attack on the Golan town of Majdal Shams in late July killed 12 children.

The changes reflected fears in Israel that Hezbollah will ramp up rocket attacks before a ceasefire comes into effect, as the sides seek to maximize gains before laying down arms.

Israel’s high-level security cabinet was slated to convene later Tuesday to decide on whether to sign off on a 60-day ceasefire halting more than a year of hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel, which flared into all-out war in late September.

Throughout Monday evening and into Tuesday morning, rocket warning sirens blared in Israeli communities near the Lebanon border and the Galilee region as rockets arched from Lebanon into Israel.

A barrage of 10 rockets targeting the coastal city of Nahariya and nearby areas Monday night saw some projectiles and shrapnel impact in inhabited areas.

A 70-year-old woman was hospitalized in serious condition following the rocket volley, the Magen David Adom ambulance service said. A man in his 80s was also lightly hurt in the attack. The two were both wounded by shrapnel, medics said.

Several others were treated for acute anxiety.

A video appeared to show a building in the city on fire after being struck by shrapnel.

The IDF says a barrage of 10 rockets was launched from Lebanon at the Western Galilee a short while ago.

Several of the rockets were intercepted and impacts were also identified, the military says.

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Early Tuesday morning, the IDF said it downed a drone that crossed into the Golan Heights “from the east,” referring to Iraq, where Iran-backed terror groups have launched attacks on Israel from.

Hours later, an IDF soldier was seriously wounded in a Hezbollah drone attack on the Mount Hermon area, the military said, adding that it was investigating the incident.

The servicewoman was taken to a hospital for treatment after a drone launched from Lebanon exploded near soldiers in the Hermon.

In Kiryat Shmona, a home suffered significant damage after being hit by a rocket fired from Lebanon, police and the Fire and Rescue Services said. There were no reports of injuries in that incident.

In Lebanon, the health ministry said Israeli strikes killed at least 31 people across the country on Monday, most of them in the south, though the figures do not differentiate between civilians and combatants.

Airstrikes continued Tuesday, with the IDF warning civilians to stay away from six buildings in Hezbollah’s southern Beirut stronghold where it was thought to be hiding assets, followed by Lebanese reports of strikes there.

The IDF earlier said fighter jets struck 25 sites belonging to the Hezbollah executive council, in southern Lebanon’s Nabatieh, the northeastern city of Baalbek, the Beqaa Valley, Beirut’s southern suburbs, and the outskirts of the Lebanese capital.

Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency earlier reported Israeli strikes on Tyre and Nabatieh after Israel issued evacuation warnings for parts of the main southern cities.

Israel later announced that a senior Hezbollah commander was killed in a recent airstrike in the coastal Lebanese city of Tyre. Ahmed Subhi Hazima, head of operations in Hezbollah’s coastal region of southern Lebanon had advanced numerous attacks against Israel from the western sector of southern Lebanon, including infiltrations and anti-tank missile attacks, the IDF said.

NNA also reported “a drone strike that targeted a residential complex” in a Druze-majority town on the outskirts of Beirut, without prior evacuation calls.

Lebanon’s Druze community follows an offshoot of Shiite Islam, and its heartland around Mount Lebanon has largely been spared in the current hostilities.

The Lebanese education ministry suspended classes in schools, technical institutes, and private higher education institutions in Beirut and a number of surrounding areas, citing “the current dangerous conditions.” The ministry has taken similar measures in the past during the fighting.

Also, the IDF confirmed launching evening airstrikes on the Syria-Lebanon border, targeting what it said were routes used by Hezbollah to smuggle Iranian weapons.

Syria’s state news agency SANA said the strikes damaged several bridges in the Al-Qusayr area, and wounded two people.

The Israeli military said the strikes were part of efforts against Hezbollah’s Unit 4400, which is tasked with delivering weapons from Iran and its proxies to Lebanon, via Syria and Iraq.

Israel has carried out airstrikes on Iranian weapons shipments to Hezbollah via Syria since at least 2013, according to foreign sources and occasional details released by military officials.

Israel and Hezbollah last fought a direct war in 2006, but the fragile ceasefire that held calm along the Israel-Lebanon border was shattered on October 8, 2023, as Hezbollah began firing rockets and drones on a near-daily basis over the border in support of allied terror group Hamas.

Tens of thousands of northern Israel residents have been displaced since due to the attacks and fears that the Shiite terror group would launch a similar invasion to that of Hamas, which slaughtered 1,200 people in southern Israel and kidnapped 251 on October 7.

Israel stepped up its offensive on Hezbollah in Lebanon in late September, launching extensive strikes and operations that took out most of the group’s leadership, including its longtime leader Hassan Nasrallah.

Israel also launched a ground operation in southern Lebanon with the aim of clearing Hezbollah strongholds in the area and making it safe for evacuated residents of northern Israel to return to their homes.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was set to convene ministers in Tel Aviv on Tuesday evening to approve a 60-day ceasefire with the Hezbollah terror group, an Israeli official told The Times of Israel on Monday.

At the same time, the official stressed that Israel was accepting a cessation of hostilities, not an end to the war on Hezbollah.

“We don’t know how long it will last,” the official said of the ceasefire. “It could be a month, it could be a year.”

Lebanese sources told Reuters on Monday that US President Joe Biden and French President Emmanuel Macron were expected to announce a ceasefire imminently.

In Washington, White House national security spokesperson John Kirby said, “We’re close,” but “nothing is done until everything is done.”

Meanwhile, local council leaders in the north continued to express anger Tuesday morning over the expected truce, saying it didn’t guarantee the safety of residents.

“Do not surrender to terrorism. Do not make this shameful agreement. This is a sad arrangement, an agreement of surrender by the Israeli government to Hezbollah, an arm of Iran,” Metula Mayor David Azoulay told Channel 13 news.

“The threat has not been removed. We will not agree to return to the reality of October 7 in the north,” he said.

Azoulay said that 70 percent of homes in Metula have been damaged and that residents should not agree to return.

“The reconstruction will take at least two years. For as long as there is no real security here, not just a ‘sense of security,’ we will do everything to not return,” he said.

Moshav Margaliot Chairman Eitan Davidi told Channel 12 that it was inconceivable that “we will be relying on Lebanon to guarantee our safety,” referring to the fact that the agreement will not include a buffer zone secured by the IDF.

“Northern residents didn’t leave their homes for over a year just to return to having Hezbollah as neighbors,” Davidi said.

The military has reportedly told Netanyahu that it has broadly achieved its aims in Lebanon against Hezbollah.

In contrast, the European Union’s foreign policy chief urged Israel on Tuesday to back the proposed deal, which he said has all the necessary security guarantees for Israel.

Speaking at a G7 Foreign Ministers meeting, Josep Borrell said there was no excuse for not implementing the deal, adding that pressure should be exerted on Israel to approve it.