Hezbollah rocket fire now targeting areas with some two million inhabitants

The Hezbollah terror group expanded the range of its rocket attacks overnight to include the greater Haifa area and the Jezreel Valley, putting some two million Israelis in range of their strikes.

“Hundreds of thousands of people had to take refuge in bomb shelters” across northern Israel, military spokesman Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani tells AFP after the strikes overnight and early in the morning.

The IDF said that rockets had been fired “toward civilian areas,” pointing to a possible escalation after previous barrages had mainly been aimed at military targets.

One rocket struck near a residential building in Kiryat Bialik, a community near Haifa, wounding at least three people and setting buildings and cars on fire.

Avi Vazana raced to a shelter with his wife and 9-month-old baby before he heard the boom of the rocket hitting in Kiryat Bialik. Then he went back outside to see if anyone was hurt.

“I ran without shoes, without a shirt, only with pants. I ran to this house when everything was still on fire to try to find if there are other people,” he says.

Hezbollah has fired thousands of rockets into Israel since October 8. It has also launched hundreds of drones. But the terror group has largely aimed its fire at the Galilee and Golan Heights areas of northern Israel.

The terror group is believed to have rockets and missiles capable of hitting almost all of Israel.