At least eight killed after Israeli airstrike hits suburb in south Beirut

LAST UPDATE | 2 hrs ago

ISRAEL HAS HIT a suburb in the Lebanese capital Beirut with an airstrike, killing at least eight people and wounding dozens of others as the conlift with Hezbollah continues to intensify.

The Israeli military said it had conducted a “targeted strike”, while the Lebanese health ministry said the attack had killed eight people and wounded 59 more.

A source close to Hezbollah said the strike killed the group’s elite Radwan unit chief.

“Israel conducted an air strike on the Beirut southern suburbs near Al-Qaem mosque,” a Lebanese security official told AFP, requesting anonymity to discuss sensitive matters.

“The Israeli air strike killed Radwan Force commander Ibrahim Aqil, its armed force’s second-in-command after Fuad Shukr,” who an Israeli strike killed in July, also in southern Beirut, said the source who requested anonymity.

Hezbollah has not officially confirmed his death, but it said after the strike that it had hit an Israeli intelligence base it claimed was responsible for unspecified “assassinations”.

The United States had offered a $7 million (€6.2 million) reward for information on Aqil, describing him as a “principal member” of the organisation that claimed the bombing of the US embassy in Beirut in 1983 that killed 63 people.

Footage posted on social media and verified by AFP showed smoke rising over southern Beirut.

The air strike is the third to hit the southern suburbs of Beirut since the start of the Israel-Hamas war on 7 October, with the focus of the violence shifting dramatically this week from Gaza to Lebanon.

Device explosions

Earlier today, hundreds of Israeli strikes hit Lebanon, hours after Hezbollah’s leader vowed to retaliate for the two attacks targeting its operatives’ communication devices. 

Questions and speculation have swirled over where the devices came from and how they were supplied to the militant group after hundreds of pagers and walkie-talkies detonated across Lebanon on Tuesday and Wednesday, killing at least 37 people and wounding nearly 3,000.

Israel has not commented on the explosions, but it has been blamed by the Iran-backed group for the attacks.

Speaking for the first time since the deadly device sabotage, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah vowed on Thursday that Israel would face retribution.

Describing the attacks as a “massacre” and a possible “act of war”, Nasrallah said Israel would face “tough retribution and just punishment, where it expects it and where it does not”.

As he delivered his televised address, Israeli warplanes broke the sound barrier over Beirut.

Hours later, Israel’s military said its jets hit “approximately 100 launchers and additional terrorist infrastructure sites, consisting of approximately 1,000 barrels” set to be fired immediately.

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According to Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency, Israel struck the south of Lebanon at least 52 times.

Iran-backed Hezbollah meanwhile said it launched at least 17 attacks on military sites in northern Israel.

The device blasts and Thursday’s barrage of air strikes came after Israel announced it was shifting its war objectives to its northern border with Lebanon where it has been trading fire with Hezbollah.

For nearly a year, Israel’s firepower has been focused on Palestinian militant group Hamas in Gaza, but its troops have also been engaged in near-daily clashes with Hezbollah militants.

Questioning

Two people from Taiwanese companies were questioned as part of a probe into the pagers that exploded, investigators said, as top officials insisted the devices were not from the island.

The New York Times reported this week that Israel had inserted explosive material into a shipment of pagers from Taiwan’s Gold Apollo, citing American and other anonymous officials.

But Gold Apollo head Hsu Ching-kuang denied producing the devices, pointing the finger instead at Hungary-based partner BAC Consulting KFT, which Gold Apollo had allowed to use its trademark.

Local media reported that the second person questioned was Wu Yu-jen, a representative connected to BAC Consulting KFT, who had set up a company based in Taipei called “Apollo Systems”.

“Our country takes the case very seriously,” said the prosecutors’ office in Taipei’s Shilin district in a statement Friday.

“We instructed the Investigation Bureau’s national security station to further interview two people from Taiwanese companies as witnesses yesterday.”

The two witnesses were allowed to leave after multiple rounds of questioning.

“We will clarify the facts as soon as possible such as whether Taiwanese companies are involved or not,” the office said.

It also said investigators had searched four locations, including in New Taipei City’s Xizhi district, where Gold Apollo is located, and in Taipei’s Neihu district.

Neihu district is the listed address of Apollo Systems, according to a company registry website, which showed that the firm was established in April this year.

Wu did not speak to reporters when she was brought in for questioning Thursday, according to local TV footage.

Economic Minister Kuo Jyh-huei told reporters Friday that Gold Apollo’s made-in-Taiwan pagers consisted of components that were “low-end IC (integrated circuits) and batteries”.

“These things would not explode,” he said, adding that Gold Apollo had exported 260,000 pagers in the past two years and “there has never been an explosion”.

When pressed on the pagers in Lebanon used by Hezbollah operatives, he said: “We can be certain that they are not produced in Taiwan.”

Premier Cho Jung-tai also reiterated Friday that “the company and Taiwan did not directly export pagers to Lebanon”.