The successive barrages of rocket attacks launched by Hezbollah at Ramat David are the deepest strikes it has claimed since hostilities began.

Iran-backed Iraqi militants in a statement also claimed an explosive drone attack on Israel early on Sunday.

Escalating attacks

The escalating attacks come less than 48 hours after an Israeli airstrike targeting Hezbollah commanders killed at least 45 people in a suburb of the Lebanese capital, according to authorities.

Hezbollah, a powerful Iran-backed group, said 16 members including senior leader Ibrahim Aqil and another commander, Ahmed Wahbi, were among those killed in the deadliest strike in nearly a year of conflict with Israel.

Israel’s army said it hit an underground gathering of Aqil and leaders of Hezbollah’s elite Radwan forces, and had almost completely dismantled its military chain of command.

The attack levelled a multi-storey residential building in the crowded suburb and damaged a nursery next door, a security source said. Three children and seven women were among those killed, according to Lebanon’s health ministry.

The strike sharply escalated the conflict and inflicted another blow on Hezbollah after two days of attacks in which pagers and walkie-talkies used by its members exploded.

The death toll in those attacks, widely believed to have been carried out by Israel, has risen to 39 with more than 3000 injured. Israel has neither confirmed nor denied involvement.

In what it said was the initial retaliation for the attacks with the exploding devices, Hezbollah on Sunday posted on its Telegram channel that it had launched rockets at Israeli military-industry facilities.

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Israel quickly responded, striking Hezbollah targets in Lebanon, the military said in a statement.

US national security adviser Jake Sullivan said he was worried about escalation but that the Israeli killing of a top Hezbollah leader brought justice to the group, which Washington designates a terrorist organisation.

“While the risk of escalation is real, we actually believe there is also a distinct avenue to getting to a cessation of hostilities and a durable solution that makes people on both sides of the border feel secure,” Sullivan told reporters.

Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati cancelled a planned trip to the UN General Assembly in New York.

Israel braces for retaliation

Hezbollah has said it would keep fighting Israel until it agrees to a ceasefire in its war against Hamas in the Palestinian enclave of Gaza - triggered by the Hamas-led rampage in southern Israel on October 7.

US officials say that is unlikely anytime soon. Israel wants Hezbollah to cease fire and withdraw forces from the border region, adhering to a UN resolution signed with Israel in 2006, irrespective of any Gaza deal.

Anticipating retaliation, the Israeli military restricted gatherings and raised the alert level for residents of northern communities. The alert went as far south as the coastal city of Haifa, signalling Israel thought Hezbollah could strike deeper than it had since the war with Hamas began.

In southern Lebanon on Saturday, people described huge explosions that lit up the night sky and shook the ground as Israel carried out its latest strikes.

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Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant, who said last week Israel was launching a new phase of war on the northern border, posted on X: “The sequence of actions in the new phase will continue until our goal is achieved: the safe return of the residents of the north to their homes.”

Tens of thousands of people have left their homes on both sides of the Israel-Lebanon border since Hezbollah began firing rockets at Israel in October in sympathy with Palestinians in Gaza.

A communique from the Quad summit hosted by President Joe Biden with the leaders of Japan, India and Australia stressed the need to prevent the Gaza war “from escalating and spilling over in the region” but did not specifically mention the Israel-Hezbollah conflict.

With at least 70 people killed in Lebanon over the past week, the conflict toll in the country since October has surpassed 740 during the worst Israel-Hezbollah flare-up since a 2006 war.

Reuters, AP

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