Israel-Hezbollah fire escalates as Israeli troops push into south Lebanon

Summary

Israel sent troops into southern Lebanon on Tuesday and warned residents of more than 80 villages and towns to evacuate as fighting between Israeli forces and Hezbollah intensified. Hezbollah said it was ready for an “open war” with Israel after rocket and drone attacks early Monday toward northern Israel.

The renewed violence followed a round of rocket and drone launches by Hezbollah early Monday and a wave of Israeli airstrikes over Lebanon in retaliation. Those strikes killed 50 people, including seven children, and Israel also targeted a Palestinian militant and a Hezbollah intelligence official in Beirut’s southern suburbs, according to the reporting. Lebanon’s Health Ministry revised the death toll, first reporting 52 deaths in an earlier statement and then later reducing the figure to 40 before raising it again to 50.

Lebanon also reported that 335 people were wounded and that tens of thousands of people were displaced. The U.N. refugee agency, UNHCR, said Tuesday that 30,000 displaced people were staying in collective shelters in Lebanon, while many others slept in cars and along roads because they could not yet find safe shelter.

Hezbollah said it had “no option but to fight Israel” after more than a year of abiding by a ceasefire while Israeli strikes continued on Lebanon. A senior Hezbollah official, Mohamoud Komati, said in a statement that the “Zionist enemy wanted an open war” and had not stopped “since the ceasefire agreement,” adding, “So let it be an open war.”

On the Israeli side, the military said Tuesday it sent additional troops into southern Lebanon and took new positions on several strategic points close to the border. The Israeli military’s Arabic spokesman, Avichay Adraee, warned residents of more than 80 villages and towns to leave and said people should not return to these areas until further notice, and he said on X that the troops’ movements inside Lebanon were meant to bolster Israel’s forward defense system and create an added layer of security.

Lebanese officials and state media described corresponding changes at the border as well. Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency said the Lebanese army was evacuating some positions along the border, and a Lebanese military official confirmed to The Associated Press that Israeli troops had moved into several areas in southern Lebanon on Tuesday while the Lebanese army was “repositioning” in the area, speaking on condition of anonymity.

UNIFIL, the U.N. peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon, later said its peacekeepers saw Israeli troops making forays across the border and then returning to Israel. The Israeli army said its troops were still operating in Lebanon, but it was not clear from the reporting how many soldiers remained inside.

The fighting has unfolded against the background of the Israel-Gaza war that began after Hamas-led attacks on Oct. 7, 2023. After months of lower-level exchanges, a full-scale war in Gaza began in September 2024, and Israel later launched a ground invasion of Lebanon; Israeli forces withdrew from most of southern Lebanon after a U.S.-brokered ceasefire halted the fighting in November 2024 but continued to occupy five points on the Lebanese side of the border while carrying out near-daily strikes, mainly in southern Lebanon.

As the latest attacks continued, Syrians living in Lebanon began crossing back into Syria. UNHCR said the number of people crossing from Lebanon into Syria jumped on Monday to 10,629 from a typical range of 3,900 to 4,400 a day since Ramadan began in February, with the vast majority Syrian; UNHCR said a small number of Lebanese citizens also crossed. A Syrian farm laborer, Azzam Sweiri, told reporters he saw streets “packed with cars and people” as he fled the bombardment and said it took 10 or 12 hours to travel 30 or 40 kilometers, after which he heard that the house next to where he lived was hit by an Israeli airstrike.