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An Israeli civilian was killed in a rocket attack in the north of the country, further heightening tensions between Israel and Lebanese militant group Hizbollah following the deadly weekend strike in the occupied Golan Heights.
The Israeli military on Tuesday said about 10 rockets had “crossed from Lebanon into Israeli territory”, and while most were intercepted, one had struck a kibbutz, causing the casualty. Another person was wounded in a subsequent drone attack from Lebanon, local Israeli authorities said.
Hizbollah said it had launched two salvos of Katyusha rockets at the nearby Beit Hillel barracks, “in response to” an Israeli strike on the town of Jibchit. The militant group earlier said it had fired at Israeli fighter jets that broke the sound barrier in Lebanese air space, forcing the plane to turn around. The Israeli military did not respond to a request for comment.
Israeli leaders had already vowed a “severe response” against Hizbollah, which they blame for the attack that killed 12 children playing on a football pitch in the Druze town of Majdal Shams on Saturday.
The incident, the deadliest for civilians in Israeli-controlled territory in the exchanges of fire between Israel and Hizbollah since they began nine months ago, has raised fears of a full-scale conflict breaking out between the two sides.
Hizbollah, which denied responsibility for the attack, and Israeli forces have traded near-daily fire since the Lebanese militant group began firing rockets at Israel in “solidarity” with Hamas following the October 7 attack.
While the hostilities between Israel and Hizbollah have caused casualties and displaced tens of thousands of people on both sides of the Israeli-Lebanese border, they have so far not morphed into a full-blown conflict, amid intense US-led diplomatic efforts to de-escalate the situation.
Speaking in Manila on Tuesday, before the latest incident, US secretary of defence Lloyd Austin said Washington remained concerned about “the potential of this escalating into a full-blown fight. And I don’t believe that a fight is inevitable.”
He added: “I think we’d like to see things resolved in a diplomatic fashion.”
UK foreign secretary David Lammy said in a statement to parliament: “A widening of this conflict is in nobody’s interest. Indeed, the consequences could be catastrophic. That is why we continue to press for a diplomatic solution.”
However, the US and Germany have urged their citizens to leave Lebanon, a call echoed by Lammy on Tuesday. “My message to British nationals in Lebanon is clear — leave,” he said in a video message.
Cross-border exchanges between Israel and Hizbollah had continued in the days since the Majdal Shams strike, but at a relatively low intensity — until Tuesday’s deadly barrages.
Diplomats had previously said they expected Israel’s response against Hizbollah to be more forceful than any of the strikes it had conducted in Lebanon since the start of hostilities, but that it would try to avoid an all-out war.
“I think they’ll try and calibrate their response so as to not tip the region into war,” said a diplomat. “But it’s a difficult balance to strike.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on a visit to Majdal Shams on Monday that the country “will not, and cannot, ignore this”. He also said: “Our response will come, and it will be severe.”
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