Israel launched a large wave of airstrikes in the densely populated neighborhoods south of Beirut on Thursday, targeting what it said were underground drone production facilities operated by the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah.
The bombardment marked one of the heaviest on Beirut’s southern outskirts, known as the Dahiya, since a U.S.-brokered cease-fire took effect in November, ending Lebanon’s deadliest and most destructive war in decades.
The Israeli military accused Hezbollah in a statement of deliberately constructing the drone production sites in civilian areas, and said their existence constituted a violation of the cease-fire agreement between Israel and Lebanon.
The agreement, brokered by the Biden administration, called for Hezbollah’s disarmament along with Israel’s withdrawal from the country’s south, the area bordering Israel that was a Hezbollah stronghold before the war.
However, Israel and Lebanon have both accused one another of failing to fully implement the deal.
Before the bombardment on Thursday, the Israeli military ordered residents of three areas in the Dahiya, a tightly packed cluster of neighborhoods where Hezbollah holds sway, to evacuate from the vicinity of buildings it had highlighted on a map posted to social media.
Hoping to deter the airstrikes, the Lebanese military attempted to inspect the buildings flagged by Israel, and had contacted the U.S.-led cease-fire monitoring committee formed after the war, according to a senior Lebanese security official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military matters.
However, the Israeli military rejected the request to hold off until the Lebanese had inspected the sites, the official said. The Israel military did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the matter.
The evacuation warnings and heavy barrage of strikes that followed — the first in more than a month in Beirut’s southern outskirts — came on the eve of Eid al-Adha, a major religious holiday, while the bustling streets of the Dahiya were packed with residents shopping and preparing for the festivities.
People attempting to flee clogged the roads with long lines of bumper-to-bumper traffic, in scenes reminiscent of the most intense days of the war. Some sheltered in nearby parks, and others on the Mediterranean seafront of the Lebanese capital.
Over an hour later, the airstrikes began and continued late into the night, sending shock waves and thick plumes of acrid, black smoke over the city skyline.
Mortada Smaoui, 30, who owns a gift shop in the Dahiya, was on vacation outside Lebanon when he received news of the Israeli evacuation warnings. One of those warnings was for the building opposite his home, sending his family fleeing for safety, he said. He was now waiting anxiously by the phone to see if his home would be left standing.
“It will get harmed for sure,” said Mr. Smaoui.
There was no immediate comment from Hezbollah following the strikes.
In the wake of the Hamas-led Oct. 7 attacks on Israel in 2023, and the ensuing war in the Gaza Strip, Hezbollah, which is closely tied to Iran, began its cross-border rocket fire into Israel in solidarity with Hamas, and Israel struck in return.
After nearly a year of low-level conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, it escalated into a full-scale war lasting over two months, with intense Israeli bombardment and an invasion by ground forces.
The militant group, once considered the most powerful military and political force in Lebanon, was left severely depleted by the war, and analysts said Hezbollah had little impetus to respond to Israel’s repeated strikes since November.
Lebanon’s new government has pledged to disarm all nonstate armed groups including Hezbollah, but details of how that will be implemented remain unclear. Hours before the Israeli airstrikes on Thursday, Lebanon’s prime minister, Nawaf Salam, said in a speech that the government had so far dismantled “more than 500 military sites and depots” in the country’s south.
However, citing stalled progress on Hezbollah’s disarmament, Israel has continued to occupy a handful of positions in southern Lebanon, and has regularly carried out strikes against what it says are Hezbollah targets. Although most of these strikes have been confined to the country’s south, there has been an uptick in Israeli attacks on Beirut’s crowded southern outskirts in recent months.
Around 200 people in Lebanon have been killed in Israeli attacks since the cease-fire began, according to the Lebanese government, which does not specify how many were civilians.
Aaron Boxerman contributed reporting from Jerusalem.
Euan Ward is a reporter contributing to The Times from Beirut.
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