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Israelis run for cover as air raid sirens sound in Haifa
Residents of the northern Israeli city of Haifa have run for shelter as sirens have rung out this evening, an AFP journalist reports. “Sirens sounded in the city of Haifa and surrounding areas, northern Israel,” the Israeli army said in a statement.
About 180 projectiles and one drone crossed into Israeli airspace over the course of the day in various parts of the country’s north, the army said. The majority of the projectiles were either intercepted by Israel’s Iron Dome antimissile system or fell in open areas, it added.
Turkey says Israel’s strikes could ‘drag entire region into chaos’
“Israel’s attacks on Lebanon mark a new phase in its efforts to drag the entire region into chaos,” the country’s Foreign Ministry says in a statement.
Meanwhile, Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani has called for an urgent meeting of Arab leaders on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York.
Iraq “calls on and works to convene an urgent meeting of the leaders of Arab delegations … to review the repercussions of the Zionist [Israeli] aggression on our peaceful people in Lebanon and to work jointly to stop its criminal behaviour”, al-Sudani said in a statement.
Save the Children decries killing of children in Israeli attacks on Lebanon
“Today is the deadliest day since last October,” country director of the NGO Jennifer Moorehead said in a statement. “We’re seeing strikes in dozens of towns, families desperately trying to flee with whatever they can carry, children crying, terrified by the sound of drones and fighter jets.”
Moorehead said that all schools in Lebanon will be closed from tomorrow, impacting around 1.5 million children.
The Lebanese Health Ministry reported recently that at least 24 children have been killed today in Israel’s air attacks on the country.
Hezbollah says its leader Ali Karaki is safe after Israeli strike on Beirut
Lebanon’s Hezbollah group has said that senior leader Ali Karaki, the head of the southern front, is alive and moved to a safe place, following an Israeli air raid on the southern suburbs of Beirut.
“Regarding the Zionist enemy’s claims that it assassinated Ali Karaki, we confirm that the leader is well and in good health, and he moved to a safe place,” the group said in a statement on Telegram.
Israel said earlier that it had targeted Karaki in its attack on the Dahiya neighbourhood in southern Beirut.
Egypt urges UN to intervene over Israeli escalation in Lebanon
Egypt’s Foreign Ministry has called on “international powers and the United Nations Security Council to intervene immediately” to stop “the dangerous Israeli escalation in Lebanon”.
Israeli air raids today have killed 356 people, including 24 children, and displaced thousands in Lebanon, the Health Ministry said, in the deadliest day in many years.
Cairo, a key mediator between Israel and Hamas, has repeatedly warned against an Israeli regional escalation, which it said “threatens to drag the region into a comprehensive regional war”.
Egypt again expressed “solidarity” with Lebanon and affirmed its “total rejection of any violations of Lebanon’s sovereignty and territory”. It also said it “continues its efforts towards a ceasefire in Gaza” to try to restore calm.
‘Israel is making clear that it wants a broad regional war’
Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN), a nonprofit organisation based in Washington, DC, says “Israel is making clear to the entire world that it wants a broad regional war, not just in the occupied Palestinian territory, but also in Lebanon and Iran.”
“The only way to stop its untethered belligerence is to stop rewarding it with more and more American weapons,” said Raed Jarrar, DAWN’s advocacy director.
“Without halting Israel’s attacks in the region, there will be no path to peace, and the consequences will reverberate far beyond Lebanon’s borders.”
