Three children and seven women were among 37 people killed by an Israeli strike on Beirut that targeted a top Hezbollah leader in a densely populated neighbourhood, Lebanese authorities have said, as US and UN officials warned against further escalation.
On Saturday, Israel closed its northern airspace as it awaited Hezbollah retaliation for the assassination of Ibrahim Aqil, a veteran commander of the elite Radwan unit, along with more than a dozen other militants. On Saturday afternoon, fires broke out after a barrage of rockets from Lebanon.
Airlines including Air France, Turkish Airlines, and Aegean cancelled flights to Beirut, reflecting fears that a tumultuous week had pushed the region closer to full-blown war.
The strike on Aqil destroyed an underground bunker and brought down the building on top of it during rush hour, when the streets were filled with people returning from home and school. On Saturday, workers were still digging through the rubble, the Associated Press reported.
Last week, Israel said it was expanding its strategic aims for the Gaza war to include returning 60,0000 evacuated residents of northern Israel to their homes, which are regularly targeted by Hezbollah, then unleashed a series of unprecedented attacks on the group.
First thousands of pagers used by Hezbollah members detonated, killing and maiming their owners but also hitting civilian bystanders, including children. The next day, walkie-talkies exploded, then Israel unleashed an intense bombing campaign on southern Lebanon before hitting Aquil.
It was a spectacular show of military and intelligence strength, and long-term planning, embarrassing for the Hezbollah leadership and devastating in immediate military terms, decimating the top leadership and the rank and file.
But many inside and outside Israel warned that the strategic implications of the week-long assault are far less clear than its immediate tactical impact.
Neither Israel nor Hezbollah is thought to want further escalation, but “the margin is very, very narrow now” for avoiding it, as Hezbollah contemplates how to respond, the former head of Israel’s national security council said.
“I don’t think [Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah] is interested in total war, but at the same time he cannot avoid a response,” said the retired major general Giora Eiland. “The question is: can he find something creative enough that … it will not drag both sides to total war.”
Hezbollah’s arsenal and military experience mean that, for Israel, such a conflict would be “probably the most painful we ever had”, he added.
Late on Friday, the UN political affairs chief, Rosemary DiCarlo, also warned of the fallout of a broader conflict. “We risk seeing a conflagration that could dwarf even the devastation and suffering witnessed so far,” she said, calling for urgent diplomatic efforts “to avoid such folly”.
“I strongly urge member states with influence over the parties to leverage it now,” she told a meeting of the UN security council convened to discuss the Israeli attacks.
In the US, President Joe Biden’s top adviser on the Middle East, Brett McGurk, warned that despite fully backing Israel’s defence against Hezbollah, Washington does not think military actions will restore life to northern Israel.
“We do not think a war in Lebanon is the way to achieve the objective to return people to their homes,” he told the Israeli-American Council’s national summit, Haaretz newspaper reported.
“We have disagreements with the Israelis on tactics and how you measure escalation risk,” he said. “It’s something we speak with them about every single day. It is a very concerning situation.”
The US has insisted for months that the path to peace in the north lies through Gaza, as Biden pushed for a ceasefire and hostage release deal. McGurk said the US focus was also on “a diplomatic settlement to the north”.
On Friday, Israel’s defence minister, Yoav Gallant, said the military would continue to target Hezbollah. “The sequence of actions in the new phase will continue until our goal is achieved: the safe return of the residents of the north to their homes,” he said in a post on X.
Hezbollah began launching attacks in support of its ally Hamas after 7 October, and has indicated it will stop targeting Israel when the Gaza Strip offensive stops, unless Israel continues shelling Lebanon.
Months of missile, rocket and drone hits have killed at least 23 soldiers and 26 civilians, and in effect turned Israel’s border regions near Lebanon into a strategic buffer zone, too dangerous for ordinary life.
Inside Lebanon, more than 500 people have been killed by Israeli strikes, most of them fighters with Hezbollah and other armed groups, but also more than 100 civilians.