Lebanon

BEIRUT, Oct 31 (Reuters) - With dozens of Hezbollah fighters killed in three weeks of border clashes with Israel, the Lebanese group is working to stem its losses as it prepares for the possibility of a drawn-out conflict, three sources familiar with its thinking said.

The Iran-backed group has lost 47 fighters to Israeli strikes at Lebanon's frontier since its Palestinian ally Hamas and Israel went to war on Oct. 7 - about a fifth of the number killed in a full-scale war between Hezbollah and Israel in 2006.

30 October 2023; MEMO: Lebanon’s Hezbollah said, on Sunday, it shot down an Israeli drone over southern Lebanon with a surface-to-air missile, the first time it has announced such an incident, as clashes on the Lebanese border escalate, Reuters reports.

The drone was hit near Khiam, about 5 km (3 miles) from the border with Israel, and was seen falling in Israeli territory, Hezbollah added. Two security sources in Lebanon said it was the first time Hezbollah had announced downing an Israeli drone.

BEIRUT, Oct 26 (Reuters) - With an economy in ruins and a crumbling state, Lebanon can ill afford another war between Hezbollah and Israel.

Iran-backed Hezbollah knows this and is keeping Lebanon's crises in mind as it plots the next steps in the conflict with Israel, sources say.

As the war between Israel and Hezbollah's Palestinian ally Hamas reverberates across the Middle East, the risk of war between Hezbollah and Israel remains higher than at any point since their last big conflict in 2006.

BEIRUT, October 25. /TASS/: The international community should exert pressure on Israel to lift its siege on the Gaza Strip and protect civilians, King Abdullah II of Jordan told visiting French President Emmanuel Macron.

"The international community must act immediately to put pressure on Israel so that it would stop the war, protect civilians and lift its siege on the Gaza Strip," the Jordan News Agency, or Petra, quoted the Jordanian monarch as saying.

BEIRUT (AP) — A top official with Hezbollah vowed that Israel will pay a high price whenever it starts a ground offensive in the Gaza Strip and said Saturday that his militant group based in Lebanon already is “in the heart of the battle.”

The comments by Hezbollah’s deputy leader, Sheikh Naim Kassem, came as Israel shelled and made drone strikes in southern Lebanon and Hezbollah fired rockets and missiles toward Israel. Hezbollah said six of its fighters were killed Saturday, the highest daily toll since the violence began two weeks ago.

BEIRUT (AP) — Lebanon’s militant Hezbollah group said Monday it has started destroying surveillance cameras on several Israeli army posts along the border as tension rose following the Israel-Hamas war that began Oct.7.

Hezbollah’s military media arm released a video showing snipers shooting at and destroying surveillance cameras placed on five points along the Lebanon-Israel border including one outside the Israeli town of Metula.

BEIRUT, October 15. /TASS/: The Palestinian movement Hamas believes that Russia is capable of playing a key role to put an end to the military escalation in the Middle East, which was triggered by Israeli aggression, Ali Baraka, head of Hamas National Relations Abroad, told TASS.

BEIRUT, Oct. 14 (Xinhua) -- An Israeli drone on Saturday morning launched several missiles toward an armed group at a border point in southern Lebanon, Lebanese military sources told Xinhua.

The unnamed sources added that the drone flew for several minutes along the borderline and then launched several air-to-surface missiles towards the axis of Hunin Hill in the central sector of the border area.

Initial information indicated that the drone targeted three armed individuals trying to approach the border fence separating Lebanon and Israel on this axis.

KHIAM, Lebanon (AP) — A Reuters videographer killed in Israeli shelling of southern Lebanon was laid to rest in his hometown Saturday in a funeral procession attended by hundreds of people.

Draped in a Lebanese flag, Issam Abdallah’s body was carried on a stretcher through the streets of the southern town of Khiam, from his family’s home to the local cemetery.

Dozens of journalists and Lebanese lawmakers attended the funeral.

14 October 2023; AA: The Israeli army said air defenses intercepted two flying aircraft overnight Friday above the northern city of Haifa. 

A statement said the aircraft were shot down after air-raid sirens blared near the Arab-majority city of Shefa-Amr in Israel.

No injuries were reported.