Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu threatened the Iran-backed, Lebanon-based militant group Hezbollah that Sunday’s air strikes in southern Lebanon were “not the end of the story.” The two sides exchanged the heaviest fire since the Gaza war began in October last year, sending the region into turmoil.
The Israeli prime minister did not provide any details about a future attack on Hezbollah targets, but he did indicate that Israel’s actions in the immediate future would be aimed at “changing the situation in the north.”
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) deployed 100 fighter jets that hit more than 40 targets in Lebanon within seven hours. Hezbollah also fired hundreds of rockets and drones at Israel.
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Netanyahu said the attacks destroyed “thousands of short-range missiles, all of which were intended to attack our citizens and our forces in the Galilee” in northern Israel.
He also said that Israeli forces had “intercepted all drones fired by Hezbollah at a strategic target in the center of the country.”
Netanyahu did not name the target, but Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah described it as “a military intelligence base 110 kilometers inside Israeli territory” outside Tel Aviv, an apparent reference to the Glilot military base, where the Mossad and military intelligence agencies such as the electronic surveillance department of Unit 8200 are based.
Two Hezbollah fighters and one fighter from an allied group were killed in the attacks on Lebanon. An Israeli naval officer was killed and two other soldiers were wounded on a patrol boat off the coast of northern Israel that was hit by shrapnel from an Iron Dome interceptor missile.
Meanwhile, Hamas’s armed wing said on Sunday evening (25 August) that it had fired an “M90” rocket at Tel Aviv in response to alleged “Israeli massacres of civilians”.
In Rishon LeZion, about 24 kilometers south of Tel Aviv, the sirens sounded, but the rocket landed “in an open field.”
A Hamas representative also said on Sunday evening that they reject the new Israeli conditions set out in the ceasefire talks in the Gaza Strip.
“We will not accept any discussions about withdrawing from what we agreed on July 2 or about new conditions,” Hamas official Osama Hamdan told the group’s Al-Aqsa television station on Sunday.
(With contributions from agencies)
Disclaimer: WION attaches great importance to accurately and responsibly reporting the current developments in the Israel-Palestine conflict following the Hamas attacks. However, we cannot independently verify the authenticity of all statements, photos and videos.
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