In the last two weeks, as tensions between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon have escalated, more than 250,000 Syrians and 82,000 Lebanese have crossed into Syria.
An Israeli Apache attack helicopter has been seen firing missiles towards the Lebanese border, followed by smoke rising from southern Lebanon.
That comes on the same day the Israeli military (IDF) carried out another series of overnight air strikes on Beirut’s southern suburbs.
The Israeli military said it targeted Hezbollah’s central intelligence headquarters around midnight. It did not say who it was aiming for or if any militants were killed in that strike, but it claimed to have killed 100 Hezbollah fighters in the last 24 hours.
Around 1,400 Lebanese, including Hezbollah fighters and civilians, have been killed and some 1.2 million driven from their homes since Israel ramped up its aerial campaign in September, aiming to cripple Hezbollah and push it away from the countries’ shared border.
Meanwhile, Hezbollah launched around 100 rockets into Israel on Friday, the Israel military said.
Israeli ground offensive
Israel launched its ground operation in Lebanon on Tuesday and its forces have been clashing with Hezbollah militants in a narrow strip along the border.
Israel has vowed to put an end to Hezbollah fire into northern Israel, after nearly a year of exchanges between the two sides that drove tens of thousands of people from their homes on both sides of the border.
Israeli Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani told reporters Friday that the ground operations were limited, aimed at rooting out Hezbollah militants and making the border safe for northern residents of Israel to return to their homes.
Hezbollah is believed to have received much of its weaponry through Syria from Iran, its main backer.
More than 250,000 Syrians and 82,000 Lebanese have fled across the border into Syria during the past two weeks.
Hezbollah began firing into Israel the day after the Hamas attack on southern Israel on 7 October, in which the militants killed 1,200 people and took 250 others hostage.
Since then, Israel’s campaign in Gaza in retaliation has killed more than 41,000 Palestinians, just over half of them women and children, according to local health officials.
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