Hezbollah fires 62 rockets at Israel air surveillance base in 'initial response' to Dahieh strike
Hezbollah fired dozens of rockets at northern Israel on Saturday, warning that the barrage was its initial response to Israel's assassination of a top leader from the allied Hamas group in the Lebanese capital's southern suburbs earlier this week.
The rocket attack came a day after Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah said that his group must retaliate for the killing of Saleh Arouri, the deputy political leader of Hamas in a Hezbollah stronghold south of Beirut. Nasrallah said that if Hezbollah did not strike back, all of Lebanon would be vulnerable to Israeli attack. He appeared to be making his case for a response to the Lebanese public, even at the risk of escalating the fighting between Hezbollah and Israel as the war between Israel and Hamas rages on.
Hezbollah said Saturday that it launched 62 rockets toward an Israeli air surveillance base on Mount Meron and that it scored direct hits. The Israeli military said about 40 rockets were fired toward Meron and that a base was targeted, but made no mention of the base being hit. It said it struck the Hezbollah cell that fired the rockets.
Air raid sirens went off in towns and cities across northern Israel, later also blaring in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.
The Israel-Lebanon border has seen regular exchanges of fire, mainly between Israeli forces and Hamas ally Hezbollah, since the Israel-Hamas war broke out on October 7.
Israel has not claimed responsibility for the strike that killed Arouri, the first on the Lebanese capital since hostilities began last year.
Nearly three months of cross-border fire have killed 175 people in Lebanon, including 129 Hezbollah fighters, but also more than 20 civilians including three journalists.
In northern Israel, nine soldiers and at least four civilians have been killed, according to Israeli authorities.
Source: Associated Press, Agence France Presse
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