Netanyahu Orders Israel To Escalate Strikes In Lebanon To Crush Hezbollah

Israel intensified strikes in southern Lebanon as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he had ordered the military to escalate its offensive to “crush” Hezbollah, in a further erosion of an already fragmented ceasefire.

Hezbollah said it staged several attacks on Monday on three barracks and a military post in northern Israel “in response to the violation of the ceasefire” by Israel.

Al Jazeera

The Israeli air force carried out successive strikes in the Bekaa valley in eastern Lebanon on Monday evening, according to Lebanon’s National News Agency (NNA), and dozens of Israeli strikes earlier targeted towns and villages in southern Lebanon, killing three people in two cars and on a motorcycle, NNA reported.

Lebanese authorities said Israeli strikes since early March have killed more than 3,100 people, and the Israeli military announced on Monday that a soldier had been killed the previous day in southern Lebanon, bringing the number of Israeli soldiers killed since the outbreak of hostilities with Hezbollah to 23.

Netanyahu said in a video statement posted on his Telegram channel, “I have ordered an even greater acceleration of our operations,” as residents fled the southern suburbs of Beirut, a Hezbollah stronghold, an Agence France-Presse correspondent reported.

Fighting between Israel and Hezbollah intensified Tuesday as Israel said it was “deepening its operation” in Lebanon and Netanyahu said the IDF was operating with large forces on the ground and seizing dominant terrain.

Netanyahu also said the threat of drones from Hezbollah “requires us to increase the strikes, to increase the intensity” of the fighting, while the Washington Post reported that civilians were forced to flee as the IDF pushed beyond the territory it has continued to occupy under the U.S.-brokered ceasefire.

Al Jazeera

Lebanese health officials told the Washington Post that more than 700 people have been killed in Lebanon since the ceasefire went into effect in mid-April, and at least 10 Israeli soldiers have been killed in southern Lebanon in that period.

The Washington Post said rare talks between Israel and Lebanon, facilitated by the United States, led to the initial ceasefire and that it was extended twice, most recently in mid-May after talks that included larger delegations.

In parallel, Al Jazeera reported that Israeli attacks across southern Lebanon killed at least 31 people and wounded 40 others on Tuesday, as Israeli forces intensified strikes and issued dozens of displacement orders for towns and villages in the country’s south and east.

The conflict’s widening scope is playing out against a broader diplomatic backdrop, with the Guardian reporting waning hopes for an imminent deal between the US and Iran and citing Tehran’s view that confusion in US positions and Israeli interference made a complete agreement difficult to secure.

“Israeli attacks across southern Lebanon killed at least 31 people and wounded 40 others on Tuesday, as Israeli forces intensified strikes and issued dozens of displacement orders for towns and villages in the country’s south and east”

Al Jazeera

Iran’s negotiating team spokesperson Esmail Baghaei said at the weekly foreign ministry press briefing that future management of the strait of Hormuz was a matter for Oman and Iran to reach agreement on, and that it was not tolls being proposed but “fees for navigational services”.

The Washington Post said a fragile ceasefire on both fronts has come under increasing strain, with Israel “deepening its operation” in Lebanon while Tehran threatened to retaliate after overnight U.S. strikes on Iran.

In Lebanon, the Nightly reported that Israel expanded ground operations beyond a demarcation line it set up several kilometres inside Lebanese territory after an April 16 ceasefire with Hezbollah, and said the line forms part of a proposed buffer zone extending 5km to 10km into southern Lebanon.

The Nightly also said Lebanon’s health ministry put the cumulative toll from the Israeli offensive since March 2 at 3213 dead and 9737 wounded by May 26, while the World Health Organization said at least 608 people in Lebanon have been killed in Israeli attacks since the truce.