Israeli shelling in Lebanese border town ‘kills elderly woman’
21 December 2023, 14:04
Later on Thursday Hamas fired a fresh barrage of rockets at Tel Aviv.
Israeli shelling in the Lebanese border town of Maroun El-Ras on Thursday killed an elderly woman in her 80s and wounded her husband, Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency said.
The Israeli military said it launched artillery and airstrikes on Hezbollah militant positions in southern Lebanon late on Wednesday and early on Thursday. It did not immediately comment on the strike that was reported to have killed the Lebanese civilian.
Israeli forces and members of Hezbollah have clashed along the Lebanon-Israel border almost daily since the beginning of the Israel-Hamas war.
Lebanese state media said Israeli warplanes carried out airstrikes deep inside Lebanon late on Wednesday, hitting a forested area more than 20km (12 miles) from the border.
Earlier in the day, Hezbollah announced it had launched surface-to-air missiles at Israeli military helicopters. The group later announced that one of its fighters had been killed in an Israeli strike on a house in the town of Markaba.
More than 110 Hezbollah fighters and at least 16 civilians have been killed on the Lebanese side of the border, while at least nine soldiers and five civilians have been killed on the Israeli side during the Israel-Hamas war.
Also on Thursday, Hamas fired another barrage of rockets at Tel Aviv, setting off air raid sirens in central Israel.
There were no immediate reports of casualties or damage from Thursday’s attack, but it underscored the militant group’s resilience more than 10 weeks into Israel’s blistering air and ground campaign in Gaza.
Israel was carrying out strikes and other operations across Gaza, but a territory-wide communications outage made it difficult to confirm details about the fighting.
The offensive has devastated much of northern Gaza, killed nearly 20,000 Palestinians according to the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry, and driven some 1.9 million people — nearly 85% of the Palestinian territory’s population — from their homes.
The widespread destruction and heavy civilian death toll has drawn increasing international calls for a ceasefire. Israel has vowed to keep fighting until it destroys Hamas.
The war was ignited by Hamas’s October 7 attack into southern Israel, in which Palestinian militants killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducted around 240.
On Thursday Israeli police said 19 Israeli prison guards are under investigation in the death of a 38-year-old Palestinian security prisoner in their custody.
Thaer Abu Assab was found with “severe signs of violence” on his body, according to the Palestinian Prisoners’ Club, an advocacy group. He died on November 18 at the Ketziot prison in the southern Negev Desert.
Abu Assab was arrested in 2005 and was serving a 25-year sentence for attempted murder.
The Prisoners’ Club demanded an investigation, including an autopsy. Police originally told the group that it was difficult to identify the guards involved due to their helmets.
Police announced the investigation of the guards on Thursday, after a gag order expired. The Israel Prison Service said it was co-operating.
The Prisoners’ Club says about 7,800 Palestinians are currently held in Israeli prisons. Hundreds were rounded up since October 7.
Rights activists say the number of so-called administrative detainees, who are people held without trial or charges, is a record high.
