Israel, Hezbollah engage in clashes

FE Team | Published: November 04, 2023 21:31:46

JERUSALEM, Nov 04 (AFP/AP): The Israeli military and powerful Lebanese movement Hezbollah engaged in cross-border clashes on Saturday, with both claiming to have hit each other's positions along the frontier.
The latest skirmishes came a day after Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah warned that the war between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip could turn into a regional conflict if Israel pushed on with its offensive in the Palestinian territory.
On Saturday, the Israeli military said it had struck "two terrorist cells" and a Hezbollah post after an attempted attack from Lebanon.
"In response to two terrorist cells attempting to fire from Lebanon toward Israeli territory, the IDF (military) struck the cells and a Hezbollah observation post," a military statement said.
It said it had also responded to mortar fire from Lebanon into northern Israel, where no casualties were reported. Hezbollah said it had simultaneously attacked five Israeli positions along the border.
Hours later it announced a new attack on the Al-Abbad Israeli position without specifying what kind of weapon was used. Israel's military said in a new statement that its fighter jets struck "terror targets" of Hezbollah, accompanied by tank and artillery fire.
"The Hezbollah targets struck include terror infrastructure, rocket storage sites and military compounds," it said.
Blinken warns Israel that humanitarian
conditions in Gaza must improve
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken warned Israel on Friday that it risks destroying an eventual possibility for peace unless it acts swiftly to improve humanitarian conditions in Gaza for Palestinian civilians as it intensifies its war against Hamas.
In a blunt call for Israel to pause military operations in the territory to allow for the immediate and increased delivery of assistance, Blinken said the current situation would drive Palestinians toward further radicalism and effectively end prospects for any eventual resumption of peace talks to end the conflict.
Average Palestinian in Gaza living
on 2 pieces of bread a day
The average Palestinian in Gaza is living on two pieces of Arabic bread made from flour the United Nations had stockpiled in the region, yet the main refrain now being heard in the street is "Water, water," the Gaza director for the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees said Friday.
Thomas White, who said he traveled "the length and breadth of Gaza in the last few weeks," described the place as a "scene of death and destruction." No place is safe now, he said, and people fear for their lives, their future and their ability to feed their families.
The Palestinian refugee agency, known as UNRWA, is supporting about 89 bakeries across Gaza, aiming to get bread to 1.7 million people, White told diplomats from the U.N.'s 193 member nations in a video briefing from Gaza.
But, he said, "now people are beyond looking for bread. It's looking for water."
12 killed at Gaza UN
school in Israeli strike
The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said Saturday that at least 12 people had been killed when Israel struck a United Nations school where thousands of displaced Palestinians were sheltering.
The ministry reported in a statement "12 martyrs and upwards of 54 wounded so far as a result of targeting Al-Fakhura school, which is sheltering thousands of displaced people in Jabalia (refugee) camp in the northern Gaza Strip".
UN chief 'horrified' by Israeli
strike on Gaza ambulances
The head of the United Nations was "horrified" by a strike by Israeli forces on a convoy of ambulances in Gaza on Friday, he said in a statement, adding that the conflict "must stop."
The Palestinian Red Crescent Society has said one of its ambulances was struck "by a missile fired by the Israeli forces" just feet from the entrance to the hospital in Gaza City, in an attack it says killed 15 people and wounded more than 60 others.