Israeli air strikes killed two people in southern Lebanon on Friday, state media and the ministry of health reported, with Israel’s military saying it had targeted members of Hezbollah.
According to Lebanon’s official National News Agency (NNA), one man “was targeted by an Israeli drone with a guided missile while he was driving” along the road to the village of Toul, not far from Nabatieh.
It identified the slain man as Abbas Hassan Karky.
In a statement, the Israeli army said it “struck and eliminated” Karky, calling him “the logistics commander of Hezbollah’s Southern Front headquarters”.
The military said Karky had “led efforts to rebuild Hezbollah’s combat capabilities” following last year’s war with Israel, and that he had also been responsible “for managing the transfer and storage of weapons in southern Lebanon”.
The health ministry later reported that another “Israeli strike targeting a car” had killed one person and wounded another, also near Nabatieh.
The Israeli military announced a strike in the same area, saying it had targeted a “terrorist who was involved in efforts to reestablish Hezbollah’s military capabilities”.
Israel has repeatedly bombed Lebanon despite the November 2024 truce, which sought to end more than a year of hostilities with Hezbollah that culminated in two months of open war.
The latest attacks come a day after Israeli strikes on southern and eastern Lebanon killed four people, including an elderly woman.
The Israeli army said Thursday that it “struck several terrorist targets”, including “a camp used for training Hezbollah militants”.
As part of that ceasefire deal, Israeli troops were to withdraw from southern Lebanon and Hezbollah was to pull back north of the Litani River and dismantle any military infrastructure in the south.
Under US pressure and fearing an escalation of Israeli strikes, the Lebanese government has moved to begin disarming Hezbollah, a plan the movement and its allies oppose.
During a meeting on Thursday with US General Joseph Clearfield, the head of the ceasefire monitoring committee, Prime Minister Nawaf Salam stated that “Lebanon is committed to completing the arms monopoly process south of the Litani River before the end of the year”.
He demanded, in return, that Israel fulfil “its duties and obligations to withdraw from occupied Lebanese territories and cease its ongoing attacks”.
Despite the terms of the truce, Israel has kept troops deployed in five border points it deems strategic.
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© Agence France-Presse
