JERUSALEM :Israel suffered one of the deadliest days of its ground offensive against Hezbollah in Lebanon on Wednesday when six of its soldiers were killed in combat near the border.
The soldiers “fell during combat in southern Lebanon”, the army said in a statement. Their deaths mean 47 Israeli troops have been killed in combat with Hezbollah since September 30, when Israel sent ground forces into Lebanon.
The army’s announcement came after new Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz said there would be no easing up in the war against Hezbollah.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on social media platform X shared an image of the “Golani” Brigade symbol — the unit the soldiers killed belonged to — a green olive tree against a yellow background, with a broken heart emoji.
Since September 23, Israel has stepped up its bombing campaign in Lebanon, mainly targeting Hezbollah strongholds in south Beirut and the east and south of the country. On September 30, it sent in ground troops.
It came after nearly a year of cross-border exchanges of fire, launched by Hezbollah in support of its Palestinian ally Hamas following their October 7, 2023 attack on Israel that triggered the Gaza war.
Earlier on Wednesday, an Israeli strike hit Aramoun, a densely packed area south of Beirut that is outside Hezbollah’s traditional strongholds, which the health ministry said killed eight people.
Strikes also sounded over the southern suburbs of Beirut on Wednesday night, with AFP footage showing smoke rising from an area under Israeli evacuation orders. The hit came after Lebanese state media reported a wave of Israeli raids on the Hezbollah bastion in 24 hours.
Iran-backed Hezbollah said on Wednesday it had fired ballistic missiles at the Israeli army’s headquarters in the commercial hub of Tel Aviv, which also houses the defence ministry.
Contacted by AFP, the Israeli army spokesperson’s unit said it would “not react to Hezbollah’s allegations”.
The Israeli army, meanwhile, said it had intercepted some of the “five projectiles” that had crossed from Lebanon into Israeli territory.
Hezbollah also claimed responsibility for firing missiles at “enemy army forces” in northern Israel just before midnight.
‘NO TIME LEFT’
On his first visit to the border since his appointment last week, Defence Minister Katz said Israel would “make no ceasefires, we will not take our foot off the pedal, and we will not allow any arrangement that does not include the achievement of our war objectives”.
“We will continue to strike Hezbollah everywhere,” he said.
Israel’s objectives include disarming Hezbollah and pushing the militants beyond the Litani River, which flows across southern Lebanon.
Lebanese authorities say more than 3,360 people have been killed since October 2023 when Hezbollah and Israel began engaging in cross-border clashes.
Rocket fire from Lebanon on Tuesday killed two residents of the northern Israeli city of Nahariya. The deaths bring to 45 the number of civilians killed in northern Israel as a result of rocket fire from Lebanon.
The UN Security Council on Wednesday condemned a series of attacks on the UN peacekeeping mission in Lebanon (UNIFIL) in October and November, calling on all parties to respect the safety of the Blue Helmets.
“Peacekeepers must never be the target of an attack,” the Council said in a statement.
In Gaza, Hamas allies the Palestinian Islamic Jihad released a video on Wednesday of an Israeli hostage held in the strip, who identified himself as Sasha Trupanov.
When Hamas militants staged the October 7 attack, they took 251 hostages into the Gaza Strip. Some were already dead. Of those, 97 are still held hostage, while 34 are confirmed dead but their bodies remain in Gaza.
Trupanov’s mother, Lena, in a statement published by the Hostage and Missing Families Forum campaign group, urged the hostages’ immediate release, saying: “They have no time left”.
The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza on Wednesday said at least 43,712 people have been killed in more than 13 months of war between Israel and Palestinian militants.
