20 dead in Israeli strike on Beirut

Lebanon files UN complaint over pager attacks

November 07, 2024 00:00:00

Displaced children take part in recreational activities organised by civil society initiatives at a building in downtown Beirut turned into a shelter for people fleeing Israeli bombardment on Wednesday — AFP

BEIRUT, Nov 06 (AFP/AP): An Israeli strike targeting a residential building in a town south of Beirut on Tuesday killed at least 20 people, Lebanon's health ministry said.

"The raid by the Israeli enemy on Barja left 20 dead,", the ministry said of the raid on the coastal town around 20 kilometres (12 miles) south of the capital, adding that rescue operations were under way.

Flames continued to emerge from the building on Tuesday evening, according to an AFP correspondent at the scene, as several families fled the site.

It was the second Israeli strike on Tuesday in a region outside the strongholds of Hezbollah, the group targeted by Israel since Sept. 23.

Earlier, a strike targeting another residential building in Jiyeh, near Barja, killed one person, according to Lebanon's health ministry.

A security source told AFP that an apartment used by Hezbollah was targeted.

Meanwhile, Lebanon said Wednesday that it had filed a complaint with the United Nations' labour agency over deadly attacks on communication devices across the country in September, which it blames on Israel.

Lebanese Labour Minister Mustafa Bayram called the attack an "egregious war against humanity, against technology, against work", saying his country had filed the complaint with the International Labour Organization in Geneva.

"It's a very dangerous precedent," he told journalists in the Swiss city at an event organised by the UN correspondents' association ACANU.

The move comes after Israel escalated its air raids on Hezbollah strongholds in south Lebanon, Beirut and the eastern Bekaa Valley on September 23, after nearly a year of cross-border fire, and a week later sent ground troops into southern Lebanon.

The escalation kicked off with sabotage attacks on pagers and walkie-talkies used by Hezbollah, which killed dozens of people and injured thousands more across Lebanon.

Israel has not officially taken responsibility for those attacks, but Bayram said it was "widely accepted internationally... that Israel was behind this heinous act".