Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has instructed his nation’s army to additional increase invasions of southern Lebanon, as regional tensions spike amid the United States-Israeli battle on Iran.
“I’ve simply instructed to additional increase the present safety buffer zone. We’re decided to basically change the scenario within the north [of Israel],” Netanyahu stated in a video assertion from the Northern Command on Sunday, pushing ahead his nation’s said bid to duplicate the “Gaza mannequin” of occupation.
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Netanyahu’s announcement got here as Israeli forces superior in a number of areas of southern Lebanon in a concerted push in the direction of the Litani River in a bid to drive out Hezbollah, which entered the broader Iran battle in early March with retaliatory assaults on Israel after the killing of Iran’s former Supreme Chief Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Reporting from Tyre in southern Lebanon, Al Jazeera’s Obaida Hitto stated that preventing between Hezbollah and Israel had “intensified” over current hours. He stated Israeli troops had reached a tributary of the Litani River south of the city of Qantara, on the jap entrance close to al-Muhaysibat.
Hitto described the event as a “large strategic change”.
“This tributary that they’ve reached south of Qantara is just some kilometres, and in some locations, just some hundred metres away from the precise Litani River,” he stated. “So that is going to show into an enormous struggle, based mostly on what we’re listening to from Hezbollah.”
Not less than 1,238 individuals have been killed since Lebanon was dragged into the battle on March 2, in response to Lebanon’s Well being Ministry.
The toll contains 124 kids, whereas greater than 3,500 individuals have been wounded, the ministry stated in an announcement. On Saturday and Sunday alone, 49 individuals have been killed, it stated, together with 10 rescue employees and three journalists.
Reporting from Beirut, Al Jazeera’s Zeina Khodr stated there was “no let-up in Israeli strikes”.
The United Nations says that greater than 1.2 million individuals have been displaced.
Funeral held for 3 journalists
Tons of of mourners gathered Sunday in Choueifat, south of Beirut, for the funerals of three journalists killed by an Israeli air strike whereas masking the battle, an assault denounced by Lebanon as a “blatant crime”.
Saturday’s assault on the journalists’ automobile within the city of Jezzine killed Ali Shoeib, a veteran correspondent for Hezbollah’s Al-Manar TV, Fatiman Ftouni of the pro-Hezbollah Al Mayadeen channel and her brother, cameraman Mohammad Ftouni.
Israel’s army stated in an announcement that it had killed Shoeib in a focused strike. Labelling him a “terrorist”, it claimed with out proof that he was a Hezbollah intelligence operative and accused him of reporting on areas of Israeli troopers in Lebanon.
The army didn’t touch upon the killing of Ftouni and her brother.
Underneath intermittent rain, the three have been buried in a short lived graveyard – a typical apply in occasions of battle for many who can’t be buried of their hometowns.
“Fatima and Ali have been heroes,” a relative of Ftouni’s who gave solely his first identify as Qassem informed information company AFP.
Al Jazeera’s Hitto stated there was a temper of “grief, but in addition defiance” in southern Lebanon. “As individuals mourn these journalists, the message from members of the media is obvious: they won’t be intimidated; they may report nonstop,” he stated.
French International Minister Jean-Noel Barrot informed public broadcaster France 3 on Sunday that journalists working in battle zones “must not ever be focused”, together with once they “have hyperlinks with events to the battle”.
“Whether it is certainly confirmed that the journalists in query have been intentionally focused by the Israeli military, then that is extraordinarily severe and a blatant violation of worldwide legislation,” Barrot stated.
The Committee to Shield Journalists (CPJ) has documented a minimum of 11 Israeli killings of Lebanese journalists and press employees for the reason that begin of hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah in 2023, which have been supposedly delivered to an finish by a November 2024 ceasefire that Israel has repeatedly violated.
Within the Gaza Strip, the place Israel fought a battle in opposition to the Palestinian armed group Hamas from October 2023 till an October 2025 ceasefire that has additionally been repeatedly breached, 210 Palestinian journalists and media employees have been killed by the Israeli army, the CPJ stated.
