Thousands flee Lebanon amid devastating Israeli airstrikes kill 492

Thousands of people fled southern Lebanon in search of shelter yesterday as Israel pounded hundreds of terror sites, killing at least 492. Lebanese officials said the attacks from south of the border marked the country’s deadliest day since the 2006 Israeli-Hezbollah war.

Cars jammed the roads trying to escape the bombardment as fighter jets targeted stashes hiding rockets, missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles. The Lebanese government said more than 1,600 people were injured during Monday’s bombardment alone, with ‘thousands’ displaced from their homes and forced to seek refuge in makeshift shelters in Beirut – also under fire.

Lebanon’s neighbours urged restraint while Egypt pulled flights to and from Beirut effective Tuesday. The FCDO continues to advise Britons in Lebanon to leave while flights are available – but has stopped short of ordering an evacuation. As strikes pounded Beirut and the southern suburbs through Monday, Israeli Prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the people of Lebanon: ‘The IDF has warned you to get out of harm’s way. I urge you: take this warning seriously.’

It came as Israel launched another strike on Beirut targeting Hezbollah’s third in command, Ali Karaki, who heads its Southern Front. But Hezbollah last night said Ali Karaki was ‘safe’ and had been moved. Hamas reported shortly after 10pm GMT that its military branch’s field commander in southern Lebanon, Mahmoud al Nader, had been killed in a strike in Lebanon.

The Israel Defence Forces claimed on Monday it had taken out tens of thousands of rockets including a Russian-made DR-3 cruise missile hidden inside a civilian home as it started a ‘proactive offensive operation’. Its strikes follow a bold attack via its pagers and walkie-talkies, which exploded injuring thousands of officers last week. But Islamic extremists hit back yesterday, firing more than 200 rockets, including ten long-range missiles, which hit the West Bank 60 miles over the border.

Some 500,000 Israeli children were told to stay off school in the north and ministers put the entire Jewish State on alert. Pictures showed damage to residential homes in northern Israel where the Iron Dome had been unable to engage stray rockets fired from Lebanon. Hezbollah first began bombarding northern Israel to support Hamas a day after the terror group slaughtered 1,200 Jews on October 7.

Hezbollah said it will only stop its attacks if Netanyahu makes a ceasefire deal with Hamas. But negotiations have failed and the PM is applying military pressure to force Hezbollah to retreat. As Israeli jets were scrambled first thing, Netanyahu warned Hezbollah: ‘Whoever tries to hurt us, we hurt him even more.’ Israel claimed its strikes took out 800 terror sites, but by the evening, the Lebanese health ministry reported at least 492 deaths, including 35 children.

Prime Minister Najib Mikati claimed Israel’s actions amount to ‘a war of extermination’. And The U.N’s peacekeeping force had ‘grave concern for the safety of civilians’. ‘The continuing Israeli aggression on Lebanon is a war of extermination in every sense of the word and a destructive plan that aims to destroy Lebanese villages and towns,’ he said. He urged ‘the United Nations and the General Assembly and influential countries… to deter the (Israeli) aggression’.

Bumper-to-bumper traffic was seen as Lebanese residents evacuated southern cities including Sidon, driving towards Beirut. As he held talks with UAE president Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, US President Joe Biden said: ‘We’re going to do everything we can to keep a wider war from breaking out.’ But Iran’s new leader Masoud Pezeshkian warned the consequences of ‘all-out conflict’ would be ‘irreversible’.

‘We know more than anyone else that if a larger war were to erupt in the Middle East, it will not benefit anyone throughout the world,’ he said. ‘It is Israel that seeks to create this all-out conflict.’ Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, spokesperson for the IDF, said Israel is ‘not looking for wars’ but would do ‘whatever is necessary’ to ensure its security after months of back-and-forth with Hezbollah, based out of southern Lebanon.

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