‘All out war’: Fear grips Middle East
A neighbouring country to Israeli has warned of an “all out regional war” after hundreds died when Hezbollah positions were bombed.
Egypt has urgently called for calm after a large death toll from Israel's strikes in Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Teh country’s foreign minister has warned of “all out regional war”.
At least 492 people have died, according to figures released by Lebanon’s health minsitry on Tuesday morning, in what has become the deadliest day in Lebanon since Israel and Hezbollah began trading blows almost a year ago.
Thirty-five children are confirmed among the dead, along with 58 women, and more than 1600 people are injured after Israel launched a wave of air strikes across Lebanon on Monday. Israel forewarned Lebanese citizens of the oncoming attacks by hacking into the country’s mobile phone network and sending mass texts.
Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) spokesman Danial Hagari said 300 targets had been hit so far and that every house that we strike contains weapons”.
He advised Lebanese people to stay away from houses that might contain weapons.
“Hezbollah intends to launch these weapons toward Israel, and we will not allow it! Stay away for your own protection.”
The IDF said it was looking to target other areas of Lebanon which are considered Hezbollah strongholds.
The Lebanese authorities have said 274 people have died and hundreds more have been injured.
Israel has said one million of its 9.5 million residents are sheltering from incoming Hezbollah rockets.
The conflict is now the worst between Hezbollah and Israel since a war in 2006.
Egypt’s foreign minister Badr Abdelatty has warned that the rising violence between the IDF and the Lebanon-based Hezbollah terror group has severely hampered negotiations for a ceasefire and hostage release deal between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.
The ceasefire talks, which have been ongoing for months, involve Egypt, Qatar, and the United States as key mediators.
But the mission for peace has deteriorated heavily in the wake of last week’s pager explosions, followed by retaliatory strikes on Israel.
Foreign minister Badr Abdelatty said Egypt had a strong commitment to continuing efforts toward broking a truce but said progress had been hindered by a lack of political will, accusing Israel of being the obstacle.
“There is great concern about … the possibility of an escalation in the region leading to an all-out regional war,” he said.
He criticised Israel’s “provocative policies,” blaming them for intensifying conflict with Hezbollah when the goal should be de-escalation.
“Egypt, along with Qatar and the United States, has complete determination and commitment to continue” efforts to broker a truce agreement,” he continued.
“All the components of the deal are ready. The problem is the lack of political will on the Israeli side,” he asserted, despite fellow mediator the United States placing the blame squarely on Hamas.
“We are talking to our regional and international partners, including the United States, about the importance of working to stop the escalation and stop the unilateral and provocative policies that Israel is carrying out.”
Israel’s terrifying text warning
Earlier on Monday, Israel’s military sent messages to mobile phones in Lebanon. Hacking into the country’s mobile phone network, the messages starkly called for civilians in southern Lebanon to “immediately move out of harm’s way” before “extensive, precise strikes” target Hezbollah personnel and weapons.
“Shortly the IDF will engage in extensive, precise strikes against terror targets which have been embedded widely throughout Lebanon,” he said before the strikes began.
“We ask residents of Lebanese villages to pay attention to the message and warning published by the IDF, and heed them.
“This is an advance warning for your own safety and the safety of your family.
“We advise civilians from Lebanese villages located in and next to buildings and areas used by Hezbollah for military purpose, such as those used to store weapons, to immediately move out of harms way for their own safety.
“Hezbollah is endangering you and your families.
“Hezbollah’s activities are dragging Lebanon and the entire region into a wider escalation.”
It comes hours after one of Hezbollah’s top figures has declared it was locked in an “open-ended battle of reckoning” with Israel as the two powers traded more than 100 rocket strikes overnight.
Both sides threatened on Sunday, local time, to escalate their cross-border attacks despite a chorus of international calls for both sides to step back from the brink of all-out war.
Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said after intense rocket fire from Lebanon that Israel has dealt “a series of blows on Hezbollah that it could have never imagined”.
A defiant Hezbollah deputy chief, Naim Qassem, said the group was in a “new phase” in its battle against Israel.
Both spoke after attacks on northern Israel sent hundreds of thousands of people to bomb shelters and caused damage in the Haifa area.
“No country can tolerate attacks on its citizens,” Mr Netanyahu said nearly a year into the Gaza war sparked by Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel that has also drawn in Iran-backed groups across the region, including Hezbollah.
Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said military actions “will continue until we reach a point where we may ensure the safe return of Israel’s northern communities to their homes”.
“This is our goal, this is our mission, and we will employ the means necessary to achieve it.” Army chief Lieutenant General Herzi Halevi, in a video statement, vowed to “hit anyone who threatens” Israelis.
Israel’s key ally, the US, said military escalation was not in Israel’s “best interest”, with President Joe Biden saying Washington was “going to do everything we can to keep a wider war from breaking out”.
“And we’re still pushing hard.”
Ahead of the annual General Assembly, UN chief Antonio Guterres warned of the risk of Lebanon becoming “another Gaza” and said it was “clear that both sides are not interested in a ceasefire” in the Gaza war.
“And that is a tragedy because this is a war that must stop,” he told US broadcaster CNN.
Hezbollah rocket fire reached Kiryat Bialik near north Israel’s largest city, Haifa, leaving a building in flames, another pockmarked with shrapnel and vehicles incinerated.
“This is not pleasant. This is war,” resident Sharon Hacmishvili said.
‘On the brink’
Israel has signalled a focus shift to Iran-backed Hezbollah after nearly a year of cross-border fire that began in October in what Hezbollah calls support for Hamas Palestinian militants fighting Israel.
An Israeli air strike in a densely populated Hezbollah stronghold in southern Beirut on Friday killed the head of Hezbollah’s elite Radwan Force, Ibrahim Aqil.
Lebanon’s health ministry said the strike killed 45 people.
It came after a series of co-ordinated communications device blasts on Tuesday and Wednesday across Lebanon that killed 39 people and wounded almost 3,000, and which were blamed on Israel.
Israel has not commented on the attacks.
Curtin University’s Dean of Global Futures Joel Siricusa said those unprecedented attacks on alleged Hezbollah members in Lebanon had set the Middle East “on fire”.
“Israel is at war with the Iranian axis of evil, whether it’s the Houthis, Hezbollah, the elements in Iraq,” Mr Siracusa told Sky News Australia.
“The killing of all those people in Lebanon the other day with the pagers and the walkie talkies and then the assault on one of their leaders and the response … tells us that there is no going back.”
Speaking at Aqil’s funeral in Beirut on Sunday, Mr Qassem said: “We have entered a new phase, namely an open reckoning” with Israel.
“Threats will not stop us … We are ready to face all military possibilities.”
Hezbollah’s Radwan Force has spearheaded its ground operations, and Israel has repeatedly called for its fighters to be pushed back from the border.
UN special co-ordinator for Lebanon Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert posted on X that the region was “on the brink of an imminent catastrophe”.
The Israeli army said more than 150 rockets, missiles and drones were fired at its territory during the night and early Sunday, most from Lebanon.
It said it attacked Hezbollah targets in southern Lebanon in response and “to prevent a larger-scale attack”.
Schools closed
Lebanon’s health ministry said three people were killed in Israeli strikes on southern areas, and Hezbollah announced two fighters were killed.
Israel’s civil defence agency ordered all schools in the north closed after the rocket fire.
“It reminds me of October 7 when everybody stayed home,” Haifa resident Patrice Wolff told AFP.
Hezbollah said it had targeted Israeli military production facilities and an air base in the Haifa area after this week’s communication device blasts.
“In an initial response,” Hezbollah said it “bombed the Rafael military industry complexes” in northern Israel with “dozens” of rockets.
It said it targeted Ramat David air base deep inside Israel with Fadi-1 and Fadi-2 rockets in Hezbollah’s apparent first use of that rocket type since the Gaza war began.
Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah has acknowledged that the communication devices attack was “unprecedented”. He vowed that Israel – which has not commented – would face retribution.
UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy has called for an “immediate ceasefire” after a “worrying escalation” in the region.
“Our message to all parties is clear: we need an immediate ceasefire from both sides so that we can get to a political settlement, so that Israelis and Lebanese civilians can return to their homes and live in peace and security,” he said.
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