An Israeli air strike in central Beirut killed at least 11 people early Saturday, bringing down a residential building and jolting residents across the city out of bed as Israel kept up its air campaign against Hezbollah.

Four Italian soldiers have been lightly hurt in an "attack" by two rockets on the UN peacekeeping mission in Lebanon (UNIFIL), Italian authorities said Friday.

The World Health Organization says nearly half of the attacks on health care in Lebanon have been deadly since the Middle East conflict erupted in October last year, the highest such rate anywhere in the world.

The U.N. health agency says 65 out of 137, or 47%, of recorded “attacks on health care” in Lebanon over that time period have proven fatal to at least one person, and often many more.

Israeli troops fought fierce battles with Hezbollah fighters on Friday in different areas in south Lebanon, including a coastal town that is home to the headquarters of U.N. peacekeepers.

A spokesman for the U.N. peacekeeping force known as UNIFIL told The Associated Press that they are monitoring “heavy clashes” in the coastal town of Naqoura and the village of Shamaa to the northeast.

Israel has told U.S. mediator Amos Hochstein that it rejects France's participation in the monitoring committee that will supervise any ceasefire agreement with Lebanon, Arab and Israeli media reports said on Friday.

Legendary Arab singer Fairouz, whose ballads have told of love, her native Lebanon and the Palestinian cause, turned 90 on Thursday as her conflict-weary country is wracked by the Israel-Hezbollah war.

Strikes hit the southern suburbs of Beirut shortly after an Israeli evacuation warning early on Friday, according to Lebanese official media and AFPTV footage.

The Israeli military has launched an investigation into the death of a 70-year-old Israeli man who entered Lebanon with Israeli forces and was killed in a Hezbollah ambush.

Investigators are trying to determine, among other things, who allowed Zeev Erlich into the combat zone with the forces and why he was permitted to enter.

Israeli strikes killed at least 51 people on Thursday in towns and villages across Lebanon, according to the country's Health Ministry.

In eastern Lebanon, intensified Israeli airstrikes killed 40 people in 10 different towns in Baalbek province, the ministry said. Rescuers were searching under the rubble of destroyed buildings, said Gov. Bachir Khodr, calling it “a very violent day” in his province.

Significant progress has been made towards a ceasefire agreement between Lebanon and Israel, but there are still some gaps to be closed, Israeli and U.S. officials told U.S. news portal Axios on Thursday.