Nearly 500 killed as Israel pounds 1,600 Hezbollah targets in Lebanon

Israel struck Hezbollah targets in southern Lebanon and the Iran-backed group attacked military facilities in northern Israel on Tuesday, increasing fears of a full-blown conflict after Lebanon suffered its deadliest day in decades.
Israel’s military said it hit dozens of Hezbollah targets overnight, a day after carrying out airstrikes against the armed group which Lebanese authorities said killed nearly 500 people and sent tens of thousands fleeing for safety.
One Lebanese official said it was Lebanon’s highest daily death toll from violence since the 1975-1990 civil war.
Hezbollah said it targeted several Israeli military targets overnight including an explosives factory 60km (37 miles) into Israel, which it attacked with Fadi rockets around 4 am (0100 GMT). It said it had also attacked the Megiddo airfield near the northern Israeli town of Afula three separate times.
 
Changing focus
After almost a year of war against Hamas in Gaza on its southern border, Israel is shifting its focus to the northern frontier, where Hezbollah has been firing rockets into Israel in support of Hamas, which is also backed by Iran.
With the region increasingly on edge, over 30 international flights to and from Beirut on Tuesday were cancelled, according to the Rafic Hariri International Airport’s website. Airlines affected included Qatar Airways, Turkish Airways and various airlines from the UAE.
 
Fears of a wider war
The fighting has raised fears that the United States, Israel’s close ally, and regional power Iran, which has proxies across the Middle East – Hezbollah, Yemen’s Houthis and armed groups in Iraq – will be sucked into a wider war.
The strikes have piled pressure on Hezbollah, which last week suffered heavy losses when thousands of pagers and walkie-talkies used by its members exploded in the worst security breach in its history.
 
Israel’s intelligence and technological prowess has given it a strong edge in both Lebanon and Gaza. It has tracked down and assassinated top Hezbollah commanders and Hamas leaders.
Israel’s military said about 55 projectiles had crossed into Israel in the latest attacks, but the majority were intercepted and several fallen projectiles had been identified in the Upper Galilee area.
“Damage was caused to buildings in the area,” it said, adding that of the projectiles were intercepted in the Haamakim area and the rest fell in open areas.
 
The foreign ministers of the Group of Seven major democracies said the Middle East risked being dragged into a broader conflict that no country would gain from, according to a statement released after they met on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly.
Fears of regional instability
An all-out war could create instability across the Middle East in addition to a devastating war in Gaza which shows no sign of easing.