Israeli soldier killed in south Lebanon as Hezbollah claims more than 80 attacks

An Israeli soldier was killed in fighting in south Lebanon on Thursday, the military said, as Israeli troops advanced from the southern border town of Taybeh to Qantara and Deir al-Seryan near the Litani river.

Hezbollah claimed attacks on troops in the three villages and six others -- Mays al-Jabal, Qawzah, Debl, Khiam, Alma al-Shaab, and Maroun al-Ras.

The group said its fighters had launched more than 80 attacks on Wednesday, the largest daily number in the current war, and have also launched missiles early on Thursday at military sites in central Israel, where air raid sirens sounded.

"Staff sergeant Ori Greenberg, aged 21, from Petah Tikva, a soldier of the Reconnaissance unit, Golani Brigade, fell during combat in southern Lebanon," the Israeli military said.

In total, three Israeli soldiers have been killed in fighting in south Lebanon since Hezbollah drew the country into war by launching rocket attacks against Israel on March 2 to avenge the killing of Iran's supreme leader.

Israel, which occupied southern Lebanon for around two decades until 2000, has kept up strikes on its northern neighbor and sent ground troops to take control of a strip up to the Litani River, around 30 kilometers from the border.

Israeli media said six Hezbollah rockets headed for central areas were all intercepted.

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the military had already "created a genuine security zone" and was now expending it, pushing deeper into Lebanon.

"We are simply creating a larger buffer zone" that could prevent a ground invasion of Israel and missile attacks, Netanyahu said in a video shared by his office.

Hezbollah chief Sheikh Naim Qassem had said Wednesday that negotiations with Israel under fire would amount to "surrender".

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called on both sides to cease fire. He warned Israel against replicating "the Gaza model" in southern Lebanon as some Israeli officials have suggested, raising fears of mass displacement.

Israel's military said that one of its soldiers was severely wounded by rocket fire in southern Lebanon and another by mortar shell, having earlier reported an officer being lightly injured in combat.

Rockets fired towards the Haifa area in northern Israel resulted in no injuries.

In an attempt to put an end to the fighting, Lebanon's president is calling for unprecedented direct negotiations with Israel, which has so far rebuffed his proposal.

Qassem said Wednesday his group would have none of it: "When negotiations with the Israeli enemy are proposed under fire, this is an imposition of surrender."

- Health workers killed -

Lebanon's state-run National News Agency (NNA) reported Israeli strikes and artillery shelling in several locations in the south on Wednesday, where the health ministry said at least eight people were killed.

The NNA also reported an airstrike on Beirut's southern suburbs, a Hezbollah stronghold.

Israel's military said it struck a "command center" there after a renewed evacuation warning.

An AFP correspondent saw a street covered in debris, including shattered cement and warped metal, after the early morning strike, while an apartment building's upper floors appeared damaged.

The area has been targeted multiple times during the conflict and is largely empty of residents, who have fled.

In southern Lebanon, Israel's military said ground troops "dismantled a weapons storage facility" and the air force killed "several terrorists".

Hezbollah said its fighters targeted Israeli troops "massed in the border towns of Naqoura and Qawzah" and in sites across the border "with more than 100 rockets" on Wednesday.

According to the Lebanese health ministry, 42 health workers are among more than 1,000 people killed in Lebanon in more than three weeks of Israeli strikes.

Lebanese authorities say upwards of one million people have been displaced.