Israel bombards Lebanon as it prepares to expand ground operations

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free

Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.

An Israeli air strike targeted the southern suburbs of Beirut early on Tuesday as the country prepared to expand its military campaign against Hizbollah.

The Israel Defense Forces issued evacuation orders to more than two dozen villages in Lebanon’s south-west and “urgent warnings” in Arabic to beachgoers and boats along the Lebanese coast up to the Awali river, north of the city of Sidon, signalling looming maritime operations against Hizbollah.

“For your safety, refrain from being in the sea or on the beach from now until further notice,” Avichay Adraee, the IDF Arabic spokesperson, wrote on social media platform X.

Israel also announced on Tuesday that a fourth IDF combat division had entered fighting in southern Lebanon, where Israeli forces have been engaged in a ground offensive for a week aimed at dislodging Hizbollah.

The latest IDF warnings came after Israeli warplanes pummelled targets in Beirut and eastern and southern Lebanon overnight. Hizbollah said its fighters had fired several rocket salvos across the border into Israel.

The Iran-backed Lebanese group initiated fire against Israel immediately after Hama’s October 7 assault on southern Israel in “solidarity” with the Gaza-based militants, raising fears of a wider regional conflict.

The IDF also declared four villages abutting the Lebanese border in north-western Israel as closed military zones. Israel had taken similar steps in the eastern and central regions of its frontier with Lebanon over the past two weeks, prior to the launch of ground incursions.

About 60,000 Israelis living in the north have been forced to relocate because of the Lebanese projectiles. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said the offensive against Lebanon is aimed at securing the border area to permit their return.

The Lebanese government has said 1.2mn people have been displaced, most of them in the past two weeks. The displaced are predominantly Shia Muslims from southern Lebanon and Beirut’s suburbs of Dahiyeh, where Hizbollah’s headquarters was located.

Dahiyeh has been the target of intense daily bombardment by Israel over the past two weeks, including a huge strike that killed Hassan Nasrallah, Hizbollah’s leader, and many of the group’s top commanders.

On Monday, as Israel marked the first anniversary of the October 7 attack that triggered the war on Gaza, Hizbollah shot about 135 rockets at Israel’s north, according to Israel’s military, and later fired projectiles at central Israel.

Hizbollah said it was targeting a military base on the outskirts of Tel Aviv.

Yemen-based Houthi rebels also fired a surface-to-surface missile that was intercepted by Israel’s air defences.

Earlier in the day, Hamas fired several rockets at central Israel, including Tel Aviv, while the Israeli military said armed drones from Iraq were intercepted off the Mediterranean coast early on Monday morning.