Israeli jets struck southern Lebanon overnight as diplomats frantically worked to prevent a regional war after a rocket strike that killed 12 young people in the occupied Golan Heights.
Israel’s defence minister, Yoav Gallant, visited the scene of Saturday’s rocket attack in Majdal Shams, a predominantly Druze village, calling the strike “a terrible tragedy”.
The attack killed 12 children between the ages of 10 and 16 as they were playing football and wounded dozens more. “Hezbollah is responsible for it and they will pay the price,” said Gallant on Sunday, as thousands of mourners gathered in the village for the victims’ funeral ceremonies.
The Israeli foreign ministry echoed his message, saying the Lebanese militant group had “crossed all red lines,” and accused them of having deliberately targeted civilians.
Hezbollah has denied responsibility for the strike, claiming that a projectile from Israel’s Iron Dome defence system had hit the town, countering a volley of rocket fire the group said had targeted Israeli military sites.
In apparent retaliation for the attack, Israel conducted a series of airstrikes on towns in southern Lebanon overnight on Saturday, as well as one close to the Bekaa valley.
The Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, is due to convene his security cabinet upon returning from the United States to Israel on Sunday afternoon. The outcome of the meeting is expected to be decisive, as diplomats scramble to prevent any further escalation in fighting that they fear could spiral into a regional war.
Speaking in Tokyo, the US secretary of state said caution was necessary. “I emphasise [Israel’s] right to defend its citizens and our determination to make sure that they’re able to do that,” Antony Blinken said. “But we also don’t want to see the conflict escalate. We don’t want to see it spread.”
The UN’s special coordinator for Lebanon, as well as the UN’s peace-keeping force deployed along the line that demarcates Israeli from Lebanese territory, urged “maximum restraint” after the rocket attack.
Both sides, they said, must “put a stop to the ongoing intensified exchanges of fire”.
“It could ignite a wider conflagration that would engulf the entire region in a catastrophe beyond belief,” they added.
The Golan Heights was taken from Syria by Israel in the 1967 Middle East war and annexed in 1981 in a move not recognised by most countries.
On Sunday, visiting the scene of the rocket attack in Majdal Shams, the IDF chief of staff, Lt Gen Herzi Halevi, said Israel was “greatly increasing our readiness for the next stage of fighting in the north, as we are simultaneously fighting in Gaza”.
Halevi reiterated the Israeli position that Hezbollah was responsible for firing the Iranian-made missile. “A Falaq-1 rocket struck here in the soccer field, it is an Iranian rocket, manufactured in Iran,” he told reporters.
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Amid the funeral processions in Majdal Shams, an Iranian foreign ministry spokesperson, Nasser Kanaani, warned Israel against any “new adventure” in Lebanon.
Lebanese foreign minister Abdallah Bou Habib told Reuters that his government asked the United States to urge restraint from Israel. In response, he said, the US had asked Lebanon’s rulers to ask that Hezbollah –a militia whose power far outstrips other political and military forces in Lebanon– to also show restraint.
Since the 7 October Hamas attacks on Israel, Hezbollah and other militia groups have fired regular salvoes of rockets into Israeli territory in response to the assault on Gaza, although the group has said it will cease its attacks if a deal to halt the fighting in the territory is reached.
On Saturday, in the hours prior to the strike on Majdal Shams, an estimated 40 rockets were directed at Israel from Lebanese territory.
Israel has responded with airstrikes targeting towns deep in Lebanese territory as well as reported use of white phosphorus on farmland close to the Blue Line, which separates Israeli and Lebanese territory. The increase in rocket fire on Saturday followed an Israeli airstrike on a southern Lebanese town that killed multiple Hezbollah fighters.
Qatari and Egyptian officials were due to meet with the head of the CIA, William Burns, and Israeli officials in Rome to continue fraught negotiations over a deal to end the fighting, and return hostages held by Hamas militants in Gaza.
US officials have also worked for months to try to cool tensions along the Blue Line and prevent any rising escalations in response to the fighting in Gaza, which has killed more than 39,000 Palestinians.
After the attack in Majdal Shams, the White House said it would “continue to support efforts to end these terrible attacks along the Blue Line, which must be a top priority”.