Israel orders residents in Beirut’s Dahiyeh to flee ahead of imminent attack
Israel’s military has ordered the immediate evacuation of residents in the southern suburb of Beirut. The military posted a map of the Haret Hreik area of the city’s Dahiyeh suburb and told people to move away from a building highlighted in red.
Residents were warned to move at least 500 metres (1,600 ft) away from the building and surrounding buildings, claiming it was a “Hezbollah facility”, against which the military “will operate in the near future”.
Israeli air strike hits Beirut
Witnesses have told the Reuters news agency that the strike hit the Lebanese capital’s southern suburb and a plume of smoke was visible after the sound of an explosion.
Israel says strike on Beirut targeted underground weapons storage site
Israel’s military has said its fighter jets bombed a Hezbollah weapons depot in a southern suburb of Beirut. The strikes targeted “combat equipment that was stored inside an underground warehouse”, the military said in a post on social media.
There were no initial reports of casualties.
Smoke from Israeli strike on Beirut ‘doesn’t suggest’ Hezbollah arms dump hit
This strike took place at about 6:50am. It was actually three air strikes that we hear took place in the Dahiyeh area. We don’t actually know which building was targeted, but the Israelis say that this was an underground storage facility for Hezbollah weapons.
If it was that, the kind of smoke that we are seeing, and the kind of damage that we are looking at, doesn’t really suggest that it was an arms dump. Because, if it was an arms dump, when you strike it, those arms go up too [in the explosion] and the damage is so much wider.
This has been a period of relative calm in the Lebanese capital … But after five days it’s now back to Beirut and a very serious attack against that southern suburb.
Israel strikes Beirut after US assurances not to
Prime Minister Najib Mikati said on Tuesday that US officials assured Lebanon that Israel would tamp down its strikes on Beirut. He added Washington was “serious about pressuring Israel to reach a ceasefire”.
Israel has not struck the southern suburbs of Lebanon’s capital since late last week after hitting the area on a near nightly basis for weeks in attacks that destroyed buildings and killed scores of people.
