US President Joe Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke on Wednesday for the first time in two months as Israel prepared to retaliate against Iran while waging war on its southern and northern borders.
Vice President Kamala Harris joined the call, which was aimed at defusing tensions in the Middle East, a person familiar with the matter said — even as the region slides into a broader conflict between Israel, Iran and its proxy militias.
The Israeli army clashed with Hezbollah fighters just across the Lebanese border after launching an intense wave of airstrikes on Tuesday that reached as far south as Beirut. On Wednesday, it also issued forced evacuation orders in northern Gaza as it carried out airstrikes that reportedly killed dozens of people and prepared its retaliatory strike on Iran for a ballistic missile attack by the Islamic republic last week.
The frenzy of military offensives included the explosions in Syria in recent days, which were also blamed on Israel. It came as the US urged its closest ally in the region to avoid attacks on Iran’s nuclear facilities and warned against targeting the country’s energy infrastructure.
Israel’s invasion of southern Lebanon, which began late last month, has grown to four troop divisions – which at full strength could number as many as 20,000 soldiers – as the country’s conflict with Iran-backed Hezbollah intensifies.
That invasion has overshadowed the IDF’s war with Hamas in Gaza, which has entered its second year with no end in sight. On Wednesday, Palestinians reported airstrikes in northern Gaza, while health officials said they had received warnings to evacuate three major hospitals in the northern Gaza Strip.
At least 30 bodies have been recovered in a renewed offensive in the Jabalia refugee camp after five days of fighting, local health officials said. The IDF has returned to the camp several times in the past year as Hamas regrouped. Dozens more people were killed elsewhere in Gaza, and the UN warned that civilians could not flee the fighting.
“At least 400,000 people are trapped in the area,” Philippe Lazzarini, the head of UNRWA, wrote on X.
In the north, Israeli forces and Hezbollah fighters clashed near the Lebanese border, and two people were killed in the northern Israeli town of Kiryat Shmona after a rocket fire by the Iran-backed militant group, the IDF and local health authorities said . Several people were injured and social media showed houses in the city on fire.
Hezbollah said its fighters had confronted Israeli forces trying to “infiltrate” the border village of Blida after attacking them with an explosive device.
It says its militants fired rockets and artillery shells, forcing the withdrawal of Israeli forces trying to advance near Labbouneh in the southwest.
Israel said at least three of its soldiers were injured during fighting with Hezbollah this week.
The Israeli army is crossing the Lebanese border in at least four locations after launching its invasion, with each division likely supporting one entry point, an Israeli official said, declining to give more details.
Netanyahu released a video message on Tuesday calling on the Lebanese people to rise up against Hezbollah, urging them to “save” their country “before it falls into an abyss of destruction and suffering like Gaza.”
While much of the direct fighting between Israeli forces and Hezbollah fighters took place close to the border, the Israeli air force had carried out a large series of coordinated attacks that focused on southern Lebanon but extended into the Bekaa Valley, the IDF said.
Hezbollah has responded by firing projectiles into northern Israel and as far south as Haifa, a commercial and cultural center. A handful of rockets were also launched towards Tel Aviv this week.
The IDF said it had tracked 180 “projectiles” entering Israeli territory from Lebanon as of late Tuesday evening, including a major barrage in Haifa.
Israel also regularly carries out airstrikes in Syria, where Hezbollah and Iranian forces are present.
On Tuesday, Syria’s Defense Ministry accused Israel of launching three rockets that hit a residential and commercial building in Damascus’s Mezzeh neighborhood, killing seven civilians, including women and children.
Mezzeh is home to many foreign embassies, including that of Iran, as well as offices related to Syrian state security. One person was killed in an airstrike in the southwestern town of Quneitra on Wednesday, according to the Syrian state news agency.
The Israeli bombardment of Lebanon has decimated the group’s command structure, including the assassination of Hassan Nasrallah, its supreme leader.
Tuesday’s airstrikes were the second largest wave of attacks since Israel dramatically intensified its air campaign against Hezbollah in Lebanon late last month, two Israeli officials said, as the attack targeted a wide range of targets identified by military intelligence .
That wave of bombings, which began around September 20, eventually included nearly 5,000 airstrikes over several days, according to a Financial Times count.
According to Lebanese authorities, Israeli attacks have killed more than 2,100 people and driven some 1.2 million from their homes over the past year, especially in the past two weeks.
Israel has said its offensive in Lebanon aims to secure the northern border area so some 60,000 Israelis can return to their homes after a year of cross-border firefight with Hezbollah. The Lebanese group began firing rockets into Israel in support of Gaza a day after the October 7, 2023 Hamas-led attack on southern Israel.
Cartography by Steven Bernard
