Two IDF reservists killed as Hezbollah rockets pound north, drone triggers alarms
A million Israelis spend an hour in shelters as IDF chases UAV; Beirut hospital tries to prove no Hezbollah cash bunker is inside, as army gives directions to hard-to-find bunker
Two Israeli reservists were killed and three others were wounded on Tuesday, as the Israeli military battled Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Iran-backed terror group fired dozens of projectiles at north Israel, with a drone infiltration sending a million people to bomb shelters for an hour.
One of the slain soldiers — named as Maj. (res.) Aviram Hariv, 42, the deputy commander of the Alon Brigade’s 9308th Battalion, from Dolev — was killed during fighting in southern Lebanon.
Another — named as Master Sgt. (res.) Saar Eliad Navarsky, 27, of the 7338th “Adirim” Artillery Regiment’s 508th Battalion, from Tel Aviv — was killed in a rocket barrage on northern Israel.
Three other soldiers of the artillery battalion were seriously wounded in the rocket barrage, the Israel Defense Forces said in a statement.
Ten rockets were launched from Lebanon at the Neot Mordechai area in the Galilee Panhandle amid the attack.
In the afternoon, a separate barrage of some 30 rockets was launched from Lebanon at the Upper and Western Galilee, the IDF said.
The Magen David Adom ambulance service said glass shards lightly injured a 32-year-old man. He was taken to a hospital.
The military said some rockets were intercepted, and impacts were identified in the area.
Hezbollah fired at least 65 rockets at Israel on Tuesday, including at central Israel in the morning.
In the evening, sirens warning of a suspected drone infiltration sounded along Israel’s northern coast, sending around a million Israelis into shelters. The IDF Home Front Command said the incident ended after over an hour.
The IDF said the drone was launched from Lebanon and likely impacted an open area, although it hadn’t located it.
According to the military, the drone was first spotted near Rosh Hanikra, and it was tracked as it flew toward the Yokne’am area, amid attempts to intercept it.
From there, the Israeli Air Force lost contact with the drone, but the Home Front Command continued to activate sirens in several towns based on the predicted south-bound route of the drone, including in Haifa and the Krayot area and as far south as Zichron Yaakov and Harish.
Hezbollah later claimed it launched attack drones at an Israeli military base south of the coastal city of Haifa, with the group also saying it fired on a total of five Israeli tanks inside Lebanese territory and two across the border in Israel’s north.
There was no Israeli confirmation of such attacks.
Journalists tour Beirut hospital allegedly hiding Hezbollah bunker
Also Tuesday, the Lebanese Sahel Hospital in Beirut’s southern suburbs opened its doors to journalists for an unrestricted tour after the IDF claimed that a Hezbollah cash bunker is located beneath it.
The IDF had ordered that the hospital be evacuated Monday night along with other sites across Beirut that wound up being struck during a series of air raids.
Journalists who toured Sahel said they saw no evidence of a Hezbollah cash bunker.
Today I visited the Sahel hospital in southern Beirut the morning after Israel claimed – without evidence – that hundreds of billions of dollars in gold and cash were stored in the basement and used to fund Hezbollah.
I had unrestricted access to all areas, including the… pic.twitter.com/pzYa0W4R0F
— Steve Sweeney (@SweeneySteve) October 22, 2024
But the IDF’s Arabic spokesperson issued a tweet addressed to those touring Sahel hospital, offering specific directions for where the bunker is located, “according to the information available to us.”
“We would like to emphasize that the entrance may be hidden using various means that may make it difficult to find,” the spokesperson added.
To all the journalists in Beirut, including those who participated in the press tour in the Al-Sahel Hospital, these are the entry instructions to Nasrallah’s bunker we exposed yesterday:
According to intelligence information, one of the entrances to the bunker, containing more…
— LTC Nadav Shoshani (@LTC_Shoshani) October 22, 2024
Meanwhile, the Israeli fighter jets continued to pursue Hezbollah targets in southern Lebanon, striking around a dozen command rooms near Tyre, the military said.
The IDF said some of the command rooms belonged to Hezbollah’s elite Radwan Force.
Israel accused Hezbollah of placing its command centers and other infrastructure within civilian areas of Lebanon.
The IDF said it took steps to mitigate civilian harm in the strikes, including using precision munitions and issuing evacuation warnings in advance.
מטוסי קרב של חיל האוויר, בהכוונת פיקוד הצפון תקפו במהלך היום במרחב אלחוש שבדרום לבנון כעשרה מתחמי פיקוד ושליטה של יחידות צבאיות שונות של ארגון הטרור חיזבאללה בהן מפקדות של ׳כוח רדואן׳.
ממתחמים אלו קידם ארגון הטרור חיזבאללה פעילות טרור נגד אזרחי ישראל וכוחות צה״ל>> pic.twitter.com/74ybMCHWK1— צבא ההגנה לישראל (@idfonline) October 22, 2024
The IDF also released drone footage showing members of the Radwan Force being targeted in an airstrike in southern Lebanon.
Using a drone, soldiers of the 55th Reserve Paratroopers Brigade spotted the two operatives, who were seen armed with an RPG and an assault rifle. The soldiers returned fire, hitting the Radwan members.
The paratroopers then directed an airstrike against the building where the operatives were holed up, killing them, the IDF said.
Additionally, Lebanon’s health ministry said Tuesday that at least 18 people had been killed in an Israeli strike near the Rafic Hariri Hospital, Lebanon’s biggest public health facility, located a few kilometers from the city center.
The IDF said early Tuesday that it did not target the hospital but, rather, struck a Hezbollah terror target.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk said he was “appalled” by the strike, demanding a “prompt and thorough investigation.”
“The fundamental principles of international humanitarian law concerning the protection of civilians must be respected.”
Touting Israel’s operations, the chief of the IDF Northern Command, Maj. Gen. Ori Gordin said that Hezbollah’s defensive forces have been defeated in every area that troops have so far operated in.
“Since we started [Operation] Northern Arrows, we have dealt a very serious blow to Hezbollah’s command and control. Most of [Hezbollah’s] brigade commanders have already been [eliminated] for the third time,” Gordin said during a visit to southern Lebanon this week, in a video distributed by the IDF.
“All the defensive areas we attacked have been defeated. We are determined to reach every [tunnel] shaft, every underground site, every stockpile of weapons,” he added.
Hezbollah stops press conference due to IDF evacuation order
Also Tuesday, a Hezbollah spokesman acknowledged that some of the group’s operatives were captured by the Israeli army, without giving numbers, adding that Israel “bears responsibility” for their lives.
Spokesman Mohammed Afif also called on the International Committee of the Red Cross to ascertain their safety, before he was forced to interrupt the press conference after the IDF’s Arabic language spokesman Avichay Adraee issued an evacuation order for residents of the area.
Afif was filmed as he hastily wrapped up his speech and got up to leave the stage while his assistants removed the microphones. As he left, he was heard saying: “The bombing does not scare us, nor the threats. Our will is firm and our determination is strong.”
מסיבת העיתונאים של האחראי על ההסברה בחיזבאללה עפיף התקיימה בזמן שדובר צה"ל בערבית אדרעי הוציא התרעת פינוי לתושבי הדאחיה – והוא נאלץ לקטוע אותה | כך זה נראה pic.twitter.com/mCOCMj4B8k
— ספיר ליפקין | Sapir Lipkin | سابير ليبكين (@sapirlipkin) October 22, 2024
Later, an Associated Press photographer captured the exact moments of an IDF airstrike at the building in Beirut where the press conference had been held.
The IDF later announced that it had targeted a Hezbollah weapons depot embedded under the building.
At least 63 people were killed in Israeli strikes on Lebanon over the last day, bringing the total death toll to 2,530, the Lebanese government said Tuesday, while not differentiating between civilians and combatants.
Israel in late September widened the focus of its military operations to Lebanon after over a year of cross-border attacks by Hezbollah-led forces in solidarity with Hamas — another Iran-backed terror group — amid the war in Gaza.
Some 60,000 residents were evacuated from northern towns on the Lebanon border shortly after Hamas’s October 7, 2023, mass invasion and onslaught in southern Israel, due to fears Hezbollah would carry out a similar attack, and amid increasing rocket fire by the terror group.
The attacks on northern Israel since October 2023 have resulted in the deaths of 29 civilians. In addition, 44 IDF soldiers and reservists have died in cross-border skirmishes and in the ensuing ground operation launched in southern Lebanon in late September.
Two soldiers have been killed in a drone attack from Iraq, and there have also been several attacks from Syria, without any injuries.
The IDF estimates that around 2,000 Hezbollah operatives have been killed in the conflict. Around 100 members of other terror groups, along with hundreds of civilians, have also been reported killed in Lebanon.
