AMMAN, Jordan — Even as a fragile ceasefire between the U.S. and Iran appeared to hold on Wednesday, Israel insisted it would continue operations against Hezbollah, while its warplanes carried out the largest wave of strikes across Lebanon since the current round of hostilities began with the Lebanese Shiite militant group.
In response to the Israeli attacks, Iran once again sealed the Strait of Hormuz, the vital waterway that is central to the ceasefire agreement, Iranian state media reported.
In Israel, the office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday issued a statement welcoming the 14-day suspension of hostilities with Iran. But he added the deal did not include Hezbollah.
Israel has been locked in an all-out war with Hezbollah since March 2, after the group launched missiles on northern Israel in solidarity with Iran, its longtime supporter, and as vengeance for more than 10,000 violations of a ceasefire brokered in November 2024.
Netanyahu’s statement contradicted Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, who said the ceasefire would extend to Lebanon.
Just hours after Netanyahu’s statement, an armada of 50 Israeli fighter jets dropped some 160 bombs on 100 targets within 10 minutes, according to the Israeli military, striking Hezbollah-dominated areas in Lebanon’s south, east and near the capital. Some Beirut neighborhoods where Hezbollah has not had a presence, were also hit.
The barrage, which took place shortly before 3 p.m. during rush hour traffic, sparked widespread panic, while motorists and pedestrians tried to escape the debris.
In a measure of the pandemonium triggered by the strikes, the Lebanese Red Cross said it mobilized 100 ambulances to ferry casualties, while hospitals called for blood donations and urged all doctors to head to health centers to treat the wounded.
Lebanese health authorities said that a preliminary toll counted 112 dead and more than 830 wounded. The Lebanese civil defense unit put the toll as significantly higher, with at least 250 people killed — 92 in Beirut alone.
Safa Bleik, a medical coordinator assistant with Doctors Without Borders said there was a “massive influx of casualties” at Rafik Hariri Hospital, Lebanon’s largest public hospital, after Israel’s strikes.
“Here in the ER, we are receiving huge waves of wounded people, including children,” Bleik said in an audio recording the medical charity shared on its social media account.
“People are arriving with shrapnel wounds and severe bleeding,” she said.
Before Wednesday’s attacks, Lebanese health authorities said more than 1,500 people have been killed in Israeli attacks since March 2.
Lebanon’s president, Joseph Aoun, excoriated Israel’s lastest assault, saying it added to the country’s “dark record.”
“These barbaric acts of aggression — which recognize no right and respect no agreements or commitments — have repeatedly demonstrated an utter disregard for all international laws and norms,” Aoun said in a statement.
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said the strikes targeted “hundreds of Hezbollah operatives… at headquarters across Lebanon, in the largest concentrated blow.” He warned Hezbollah General Secretary Naim Qassem that “his turn will come.”
Hezbollah, for its turn, condemned the attacks, adding in a statement that it had the “natural and legal right to resist occupation and respond to its attacks.” But there were no reports of missile launches from Lebanon to Israel.
Israel’s move puts further pressure on a fragile truce already burdened by a lack of clarity regarding its terms, execution and endpoint.
Hezbollah entered the war in support of Tehran with the aim of linking its fate to any ceasefire deal brokered with its powerful benefactor. But Israeli officials say they will continue hitting Hezbollah until they can secure northern Israel from further attack.
In a phone interview with PBS News Hour’s Liz Landers, President Trump said the conflict between Israel and Lebanon was a “separate skirmish” from the war with Iran.
“Yeah, they [Lebanon] were not included in the deal,” he said. Asked why, he said it was “because of Hezbollah.”
“They were not included in the deal. That’ll get taken care of too. It’s all right,” he said.
But Iran said otherwise, with the country’s foreign ministry issuing a statement warning of “dire consequences” for Israel’s “criminal acts.”
“The cessation of hostilities in Lebanon is an integral part of the agreement with the United States,” the statement said, “and the crimes of the Zionist entity constitute a flagrant violation thereof.”
Israel’s campaign in Lebanon has triggered an exodus from the country’s south and other Hezbollah-dominated areas, forcing some 1.3 million — most of them Shiites — to flee. Meanwhile, Israel has threatened the Lebanese that anyone harboring Shiite displaced or allowing Hezbollah to operate in their areas would see their areas bombed.
That has put pressure on Lebanon’s delicate sectarian balance, with some communities expelling the displaced Shiites or not allowing them to come in the first place for fear of being targeted by Israel.
Israeli officials further compounded those fears on Wednesday, with Avichay Adraee, Israel’s Arabic-language spokesman, accusing Hezbollah of moving beyond its traditional bastions of support in the southern suburbs of the capital and embedding itself in northern Beirut and mixed neighborhoods.
“To the people of Lebanon: Do not be mistaken — the destruction that Hezbollah brought to the suburbs will move with it,” he said, adding the group was spreading “destruction across Lebanon at your expense.”
“Do not allow this; do not allow Hezbollah to bring devastation to you.”
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