Three killed in Israeli strikes on Beirut airport highway

BEIRUT, Mar 05 (AFP): Lebanon's health ministry said late on Wednesday that three people were killed in Israeli strikes on vehicles on Beirut's airport highway.
The strikes came after a third day of Israeli bombardments in response to renewed Hezbollah attacks.
"Two Israeli air strikes on the airport highway killed three people and wounded six," the ministry said.
Israel's military said it had targeted two people in the Beirut area, without immediately offering further details.
Israel issued new evacuation orders for a Beirut suburb early on Thursday, warning residents it was about to strike targets it said were linked to Hezbollah.
The leader of the Tehran-backed militant group earlier vowed to keep up its fight against Israel, whose forces pushed into several border towns and conducted air strikes around Lebanon.
Lebanon was drawn into the Middle East war on Monday, when Hezbollah attacked Israel in response to the killing of Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei during US-Israeli strikes over the weekend.
The group stepped up its attacks on Wednesday, saying it targeted Israeli positions as far as Tel Aviv in at least 15 attacks.
A ballistic missile launched from Iran and heading towards Turkish airspace via Iraq and Syria was destroyed by NATO air defence systems, Turkish officials said Wednesday.
The defence ministry said it had been "engaged and neutralised by NATO air-and-missile defence assets deployed in the eastern Mediterranean".
It did not specify the missile's intended target. Iran has been hitting sites across the region in retaliation after the United States and Israel launched strikes against it on Saturday.
A Turkish official, speaking to AFP on condition of anonymity, said the missile had been "aimed at a base in Greek Cyprus but veered off course".
Officials said fragments that fell in the Dortyol district in southern Turkey, near the Syrian border, had been identified as pieces of the interceptor used to neutralise "the threat in the air". No casualties were reported.
Reacting to the incident, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a call with Turkey's Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan "that attacks on Turkey's sovereign territory were unacceptable and pledged full support from the United States," State Department spokesman Tommy Pigott said.
The incident also drew condemnation from NATO.
"NATO stands firmly with all allies, including Turkiye, as Iran continues its indiscriminate attacks across the region," NATO spokeswoman Allison Hart said, using Turkey's official name.
"Our deterrence and defence posture remains strong across all domains, including when it comes to air and missile defence."
The United Arab Emirates "strongly condemned" the missile launch as a "serious escalation", the foreign ministry said in a statement.
Ankara summoned the Iranian ambassador to convey its "reaction and concerns" over the incident while Fidan warned Tehran against steps that could widen the conflict, a diplomatic source said.