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The Guardian - AU
The Guardian - AU
World
Helen Livingstone (now); Léonie Chao-Fong, Yohannes Lowe and Martin Belam (earlier)

Middle East crisis: IDF intercepts ‘hostile aircraft’ from east – as it happened

Israel Katz Hezbollah Lebanon Beirut Iran Joe Biden Hassan Nasrallah IDF Missile António Guterres

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Israel’s first prime minister, David Ben-Gurion, famously said: “Our future does not depend on what the gentiles will say, but on what the Jews will do.” His argument was that the Jewish people could no longer be dependent on others as they had been for 2,000 years. Instead they were independent, self-reliant and creators of their own destiny.

Today, faced by mounting diplomatic isolation over its war in Gaza – to the extent that Israel is now seen by some nations as a pariah state – Ben-Gurion’s maxim has gained renewed traction for many Israelis. These include the far-right finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, who quoted it when rebutting an international court of justice (ICJ) ruling ordering Israel to cease its military operation in the southern Gaza city of Rafah.

A UK Foreign Office official says that for all Israel’s talk of public diplomacy, or hasbara, the reality is that the instinct within its military has always been to rely upon itself, and not to wrestle for world opinion. “The IDF [Israel Defense Forces] does not care what people think about them. This is a security state. It does not want to be loved. It wants to be feared and respected. The IDF thinks the Israeli foreign office does the yoga, hot tubs and cleanups, but the IDF has always played hardball, relied on escalation dominance and never seen war as a popularity contest.”

Never has that been more clear than in recent days with Israel’s demolition of Hezbollah’s leadership, carried out without the political support of the US and now portrayed by a resurgent Benjamin Netanyahu as part of a newly declared objective “to change the balance of power in the region for years”.

International relations, like all politics, are a struggle for power, and Israel’s prime minister believes he is winning that struggle.

The Israeli military has launched airstrikes on the border crossing between Syria and Lebanon, Al Jazeera is reporting, citing Lebanese media.

Israeli military spokesperson Avichay Adraee had accused Hezbollah of smuggling weapons through the crossing on Thursday, the broadcaster noted.

Tens of thousands of people have fled Lebanon into Syria since Israel launched its attacks on Lebanon.

Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, to give first public sermon in five years

Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is set to lead Friday prayers and deliver a public sermon that could shed light on the Islamic republic’s plans after a massive missile attack on enemy Israel. AFP reports:

Khamenei’s rare Friday sermon – a first in almost five years – comes three days before the one-year anniversary of the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza, triggered by the Iran-backed Palestinian group’s 7 October attack.

The supreme leader, who wields the highest authority in Iran, will lead Muslims in prayer at the Imam Khomeini Grand Mosalla mosque in central Tehran, his official website said.

The prayer will follow “a commemoration ceremony” at 10.30am (0700 GMT) for Hassan Nasrallah, the slain leader of Tehran-backed Lebanese armed movement Hezbollah.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, who answer to Khamenei, said Tuesday’s barrages of some 200 missiles were in retaliation for Israel’s killing of Nasrallah alongside Guards commander Abbas Nilforoushan in a late September strike on Beirut, and of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran in July.

Khamenei last led Friday prayers in January 2020 after Iran fired missiles at a US army base in Iraq, in response to a strike that killed revered Revolutionary Guards commander Qasem Soleimani.

In Tehran on Thursday, crowds waving Hezbollah and Iran flags gathered outside the former US embassy building in Tehran to denounce Israeli “crimes” in the Gaza Strip and in Lebanon, Iranian media reported.

Khamenei had declared public mourning in Iran for Nasrallah and on Wednesday said that the Hezbollah chief’s death was “not a small matter”.

Another picture here shows a building very close to Beirut’s international airport going up in flames after being hit by an Israeli strike.

We have some pictures coming through on the wires from Tulkarm in the occupied West Bank, where Israel has killed 18 people in a strike on a cafe.

Al Jazeera is reporting that a mother and her two children were among those killed in the Israeli airstrike on a cafe in the occupied West Bank.

It reported that local hospitals had been overwhelmed with casualties from the attack, which levelled an entire building and was reportedly the bloodiest in the West Bank in 24 years.

Citing Palestinian media and a Red Crescent paramedic, the Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported earlier that many people were still trapped under the rubble.

Reporters have been grilling US state department spokesperson Matthew Miller about the latest Israeli attacks in the Middle East.

Asked “how long is it okay for them to keep this kind of level of attacks up [on Lebanon?]”, Miller replied that Washington was aware of Israel’s “long history” of “limited operations” turning into much longer conflicts. He said:

It’s impossible to know and it’s impossible to predict what the outcome of the fighting that’s going on in southern Lebanon is going to be over the next few days.

I can tell you that all of us here are very cognizant of the long history of Israel launching what at the time were described as limited operations … across the Lebanese border that have turned into something much different, that have turned into full-scale wars, and then at times occupation.

Asked whether Israel was taking the proper precautions to protect medical workers, after nine were killed in an Israeli strike on a Beirut health centre on Thursday, Miller said he could not give an assessment of Israel’s latest attacks.

He added that after looking at Israeli attacks in Gaza over the past year: “We did find that it was reasonable to assess that Israel had in certain incidences violated international humanitarian law.”

Citing Palestinian media and the Palestinian Information Center, Al Jazeera is reporting that three Palestinians have been killed in Deir al-Balah in central Gaza in an Israeli attack on the Jaber family home.

Gaza’s health ministry said late on Thursday that 99 Palestinians had been killed in the preceding 24 hours and 169 injured.

It noted that there were “still a number of victims under the rubble and on the streets, and ambulance and civil defense crews cannot reach them”.

A source close to Hezbollah has told the news agency AFP that Israel conducted 11 consecutive strikes on the group’s south Beirut stronghold, the suburb of Dahiyeh, late on Thursday, in one of the most violent raids since Israel intensified its bombardment campaign last week. The news agency writes further:

AFP correspondents in the capital and beyond heard loud bangs that made car alarms go off and building shake.

About an hour later, AFP journalists heard several explosions coming from the direction of the southern suburbs after the Israeli military ordered residents of the Hadath neighbourhood to evacuate.

“Israel struck the southern suburbs 11 consecutive times,” the source said on the condition of anonymity.

AFP footage showed giant balls of flame rising from the targeted site with thick smoke billowing and flares shooting out.

Lebanon’s official National News Agency (NNA) said “more than 10 consecutive strikes have been recorded so far, in one of the strongest raids on the southern suburbs of Beirut since the start of the Israeli war on Lebanon”.

The strikes echoed to mountain regions outside Beirut, the NNA said.

The Israeli military says it has successfully intercepted a “hostile aircraft” that crossed into the country from the east.

What is Israel's Dahiyeh doctrine?

One of the areas being targeted by Israel in Beirut tonight is Dahiyeh, where Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah died last week. The area has given its name to Israel’s infamous Dahiyeh doctrine, which is said to have originated in the 2006 war in Lebanon.

At the end of last year, emeritus professor of peace studies at Bradford University Paul Rogers wrote a comment piece for the Guardian on the strategy, which emphasises the use of disproportionate force. Here’s an extract and the link to the full article below:

In July of that year [2006], facing salvoes of rockets fired from southern Lebanon by Hezbollah militias, the IDF fought an intense air and ground war. Neither succeeded, and the ground troops took heavy casualties; but the significance of the war lies in the nature of the air attacks.

It was directed at centres of Hezbollah power in the Dahiyeh area, in the southern suburbs of Beirut, but also on the Lebanese economic infrastructure.

This was the deliberate application of “disproportionate force”, such as the destruction of an entire village, if deemed to be the source of rocket fire. One graphic description of the result was that “around a thousand Lebanese civilians were killed, a third of them children.

Towns and villages were reduced to rubble; bridges, sewage treatment plants, port facilities and electric power plants were crippled or destroyed.”

Two years after that war, the Institute for National Security Studies at Tel Aviv University published Disproportionate Force: Israel’s Concept of Response in Light of the Second Lebanon War. Written by IDF reserve Col Gabi Siboni, it promoted the Dahiya doctrine as the way forward in response to paramilitary attacks.

The head of the Israeli military forces in Lebanon during the war, and overseeing the doctrine, was General Gadi Eizenkot. He went on to be the IDF chief of general staff, retiring in 2019, but was brought back as an adviser to Netanyahu’s war cabinet in October.

'No action going on right now', Biden says

Some more comments from Joe Biden, courtesy of the White House press pool.

Asked why he had not spoken to Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu in recent days after he said he would on Sunday he replied:

Because there’s no action going on right now.

Asked if he worried an Israeli strike on Iran’s oil facilities would raise oil prices, he said;

If a hurricane hits, prices are going to go up. I don’t know; who knows.

Some more comments from US President Joe Biden, who after being asked how confident he was that an all-out war could be averted in the Middle East by the White House press pool, reportedly replied:

How confident are you it’s not going to rain? Look, I don’t believe there is going to be an all-out war. I think we can avoid it. But there is a lot to do yet, a lot to do yet.

Asked if he would send American troops to help Israel, the president said: “We have already helped Israel. We are going to protect Israel.”

The latest apparent Israeli attack on Hezbollah leadership, in which Hachem Safieddine, the presumed next leader of Hezbollah, was reportedly the target, comes almost exactly a week after leader Hassan Nasrallah was killed in a massive Israeli strike on Beirut that flattened several apartment blocks.

Israel has a long history of assassinating its enemies, often causing civilian casualties, and has also killed around 20 other senior Hezbollah figures in recent weeks and months.

The include Ibrahim Aqil, reportly killed by an airstrike in Beirut in September, who was one of the last founder members of Hezbollah’s military wing to have survived more than 40 years of conflict with Israel.

Fuad Shukur, whom Israel said was responsible for most of Hezbollah’s advanced weaponry, including precise-guided missiles, cruise missiles, anti-ship missiles, long-range rockets, and UAVs, was killed in a strike on Beirut in July.

Nabil Qaouk, who held a series of military command positions and had recently begun travelling to Iran, was killed in a strike earlier this week.

Ali Karaki, who had responsibility for military operations along the contested border with Israel, was killed alongside Nasrallah, as was Ibrahim Jazini, who was responsible for internal security within Hezbollah.

Updated

The chairman of the US House of Representatives foreign affairs committee has urged President Joe Biden to speed up weapons shipments to Israel, including 2000-pound (907 kg) bombs that have been held up for months over human rights concerns. Reuters reports:

“I urge you to act today to ensure all weapons shipments to Israel, including 2,000-pound bombs, are expedited to support our ally,” Representative Michael McCaul said in a letter sent to Biden and seen by Reuters on Thursday.

McCaul, who reviews all major foreign US weapons sales in his position as committee chairman, said he was also aware of more than 10 other planned weapons sales to Israel that have been awaiting final approval for more than four months and urged that they proceed quickly.

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

McCaul sent the letter amid global fears that the Middle East will erupt into widespread war, which have fuelled calls in Washington for the Biden administration to provide more assistance to Israel.

Israel, which has been fighting Hamas in the Palestinian territory of Gaza for almost a year, has sent troops into southern Lebanon, where it is targeting Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah, after two weeks of intense airstrikes.

Iran barraged Israel with more than 180 ballistic missiles on Tuesday. Israel has sworn it will retaliate.

US Republicans have been urging Biden for months to reverse his decision earlier this year to pause one shipment of the 2,000-pound bombs, citing concern over the impact they could have in densely populated areas in Gaza.

One 2,000-pound bomb can rip through thick concrete and metal, creating a wide blast radius.

“We all wish Israel did not need these larger bombs, but they are operationally necessary as Israel’s enemies, including Hamas and Hezbollah, are intentionally using deeply buried subterranean bunkers and tunnels. I call on you to allow these weapons, which are ready to ship, to be sent to Israel immediately,” McCaul wrote.

Using the 2,000 pound bombs, also known as bunker busters, in densely populated residential areas, is a war crime.

The head of the World Health Organisation, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, has called for the “urgent facilitation of flights to deliver health supplies to Lebanon,” saying medical supplies cannot be delivered due to the “almost complete closure of Beirut’s airport”.

It was reported earlier that one of the Israeli strikes targeting Beirut in the past hours hit close to Beirut-Rafic Hariri International Airport.

Following on from US President’s Joe Biden’s earlier comment that the US was “discussing” possible Israeli strikes on Iranian oil facilities, he has now been asked by reporters whether he had urged Israel not to do so.

“I know not to negotiate in public,” he said in response, according to Reuters.

Here are some of the latest images coming to us over the wires of the Israeli strikes on Beirut, which are reportedly the biggest since Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah was killed by Israel apparently using huge bunker buster bombs last week.

The Palestinian presidency has condemned the Israeli killing of 18 people in a West Bank cafe, calling it a massacre that is “part of a broader pattern of genocide against the Palestinian people in both the West Bank and Gaza Strip.”

The Israeli military has confirmed it carried out the strike on the cafe, saying it killed the Hamas operative as Zahi Yaser Abd al-Razeq Oufi and several other Hamas members.

However civilians were also present and the Palestinian news agency Wafa reported that the massacre was the largest in the West Bank in over 24 years.

In a statement quoted by Wafa, Nabil Abu Rudeineh, spokesman for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, held the Israeli government fully accountable for the “heinous crime” committed against innocent civilians.

He emphasised that such acts were part of the ongoing “comprehensive war waged by the right-wing Israeli government against Palestinians, further exacerbating regional instability and violence”.

While the international focus has been on Israel’s war on Gaza and now Lebanon, there are fears Israel is now turning its focus to the West Bank and using similar tactics there.

It’s being reported that Hachem Safieddine, the presumed next leader of Hezbollah, is the target of Israeli airstrikes on Dahiyeh, the southern suburbs of Beirut, tonight.

Hashem Safieddine, who chairs Hezbollah’s executive council, is the most obvious candidate to succeed Hassan Nasralleh. A cousin of Nasrallah, Safieddine was born in 1964 in southern Lebanon and is another founder member. He is thought to have spent many years in Qom, the Iranian religious city, and has been entrusted by Hezbollah with a variety of tasks over the decades, including managing the organisation’s extensive portfolio of legal and illegal businesses.

Safieddine is popular within the organisation and among its sponsors in Tehran. Last year he said: “It may take one war, two wars, three wars, multiple confrontations, military confrontation, the sacrifice of martyrs, bearing the burden, dealing with the consequences, but ultimately, [Israel] must come to an end.”

Israeli strikes kill 37 people in Lebanon in last 24 hours, authorities say

Lebanese authorities have announced that Israeli strikes killed 37 people in the past 24 hours.

Since late on Thursday evening, attacks on Beirut appear to have intensified, with a source close to Hezbollah telling AFP that Israel had conducted 11 consecutive strikes on the group’s stronghold in the capital’s south, in one of the most violent raids since Israel intensified its bombardment campaign last week.

AFP correspondents in the capital and beyond heard loud bangs that made car alarms go off and building shake. AFP footage showed giant balls of flame rising from the targeted site with thick smoke billowing and flares shooting out.

Earlier Thursday, Israeli army Arabic-language spokesperson Avichay Adraee had issued an “urgent warning” for residents of the south Beirut area of Burj al-Barajneh to evacuate along with maps of the area.

“You are located near facilities and interests belonging to Hezbollah, and the IDF will work against them in the near future,” he had said in a statement on X.

Summary of the day so far

It’s 1am in Beirut, Gaza and Tel Aviv. Here’s a recap of the latest developments:

  • At least 18 people were killed in an Israeli military strike in Tulkarm refugee camp in the occupied West Bank, Palestinian officials said. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) confirmed that it carried out an airstrike with a fighter jet in Tulkarm. In a statement, the IDF said it killed Zahi Yaser Abd al-Razeq Oufi, the head of the Hamas network in Tulkarm.

  • Multiple huge explosions were heard in Beirut in the early hours on Friday, with reports that at least one strike hit outside the perimeter of Beirut’s international airport. A source close to Hezbollah told AFP that Israel launched 11 consecutive strikes on Beirut’s southern suburbs. Journalists compared the latest strikes to the Israeli strikes last Friday that killed Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah. Axios reported that the target of the Israeli strike was Hachem Safieddine, the presumed successor to Nasrallah.

  • The latest Israeli strikes on Beirut on Friday came after Israeli military ordered civilians near two buildings in Dahiyeh, in the southern suburb of Beirut, to evacuate immediately ahead of airstrikes. An Israeli military spokesperson published maps alongside the announcement, warning civilians to distance themsevles at least 500 metres from the sites.

  • Earlier on Thursday, multiple airstrikes were heard in the Lebanese capital, with one of them reportedly hitting the office of Hezbollah’s media department in Dahiyeh, the southern suburbs of Beirut. An official from the media office said they were safe, despite the blast. Israel said it had targeted Hezbollah’s intelligence operation.

  • Lebanon’s health ministry said 37 people were killed and 151 others wounded in Israeli strikes on the country on Thursday. Nearly 2,000 people have been killed, including 127 children, and 9,384 injured since the start of Israeli attacks on Lebanon over the last year, the country’s health ministry said on Thursday. More than 1.2 million Lebanese people have been displaced by Israeli attacks. Lebanon’s health minister said more than 40 rescuers and firefighters have been killed by Israeli attacks over the last three days.

  • Israel’s military ordered residents of more than 20 towns in south Lebanon to evacuate their homes immediately on Thursday, signaling that it may widen a ground operation launched earlier this week against Hezbollah. Israel has told people to leave Nabatieh, a provincial capital, and other communities north of the Litani River, which formed the northern edge of the UN-declared buffer zone. Israel has previously ordered 52 other villages inside Lebanon to evacuate.

  • Israeli strikes on a central Beirut medical centre killed at least nine people in the early hours on Thursday. The Israeli strike hit a medical centre belonging to the Hezbollah-linked Islamic Health Organisation in the early hours of Thursday. The attack was the second airstrike on central Beirut this week, with most strikes having previously been confined to suburbs in the southern suburbs. The EU’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell, described the Israeli strike as a “violation of international humanitarian law”.

  • Hezbollah carried out new strikes on Thursday, targeting what it called Israel’s “Sakhnin base” for military industries in Haifa Bay on the Mediterranean coast of northern Israel with a salvo of rockets. At least eight Israeli soldiers have been killed in clashes with Hezbollah in southern Lebanon.

  • The Lebanese army said that it returned fire at Israeli forces after one of its soldiers was killed in an Israeli strike, marking the first time that the Lebanese army participated in the fighting against Israel. The soldier was killed when a Lebanese Red Cross convoy accompanied by the Lebanese Army was struck while evacuating wounded from Taybeh, a border-village in southern Lebanon.

  • Civilians are bearing the brunt of a “truly catastrophic” situation in Lebanon, a senior UN official said. Since Israel dramatically ramped up airstrikes in Lebanon more than a week ago, the pace of displacement had exceeded worst case scenarios, Imran Riza, the UN’s resident and humanitarian coordinator, told Reuters. “The level of trauma, the level of fear amongst the population, has been extreme,” he said.

  • G7 leaders expressed “deep concern over the deteriorating situation in the Middle East” and called on regional players to “act responsibility and with restraint”. In a joint statement on Thursday, G7 leaders said they condemned “in the strongest terms” Iran’s military attack against Israel earlier this week, which they said “constitutes a serious threat to regional stability.”

  • Joe Biden, the US president, said he was “discussing” possible Israeli strikes on Iranian oil sites in response to Tehran’s missile attack earlier this week. His comments quickly sent oil prices soaring. Asked if he would “allow” Israel to retaliate against Iran, Biden said on Thursday that “we don’t ’allow’ Israel, we advise Israel. And there is nothing going to happen today.” On Wednesday, Biden said he would not support an Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear sites.

  • Iran has warned Washington that any country that aids an Israeli attack will be deemed an Iranian target. In a statement issued by Iran’s mission at the UN on Thursday, Iran warned that a large Israeli strike will lead to attacks on Israeli infrastructure and that “should any country render assistance to the aggressor, it shall likewise be deemed an accomplice and a legitimate target.” The warnings came as the Iranian president, Masoud Pezeshkian, sought assurances from Gulf States in Doha that they would remain neutral in the event of any joint Israeli-US attack in Iran.

  • The death toll in Gaza has risen to 41,788 reported fatalities with 96,794 people wounded, according to the latest figures by territory’s health ministry on Thursday. At least 90 Palestinians were killed and 169 others injured in eight attacks by Israel over the last 24 hours, Palestinian news agency Wafa reported.

  • The head of the UN’s agency for Palestinian refugees (Unrwa) said three of the UN body’s schools were hit in Gaza in the past two days alone, killing at least 21 people. Israeli forces stepped up their attacks on the Gaza Strip overnight and into Wednesday, killing at least 70 people in strikes on a school and an orphanage sheltering displaced people, according to Palestinian media and officials. “Schools used to be a safe haven for learning, they have now turned into hell for far too many,” Unrwa chief Philippe Lazzarini said on Thursday.

  • The Israeli military said it killed a Hezbollah commander who was responsible for a rocket attack on the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights that killed 12 children and teenagers on a football field in July. The IDF said Khader Shahabiya was killed in an airstrike on Wednesday. The attack on Majdal Shams village, a predominantly Druze village, killed 12 children between the ages of 10 and 16 as they were playing football and wounded dozens more.

  • Israel’s military also announced that in a strike “approximately three months ago” it believes it killed three senior Hamas figures. It named them as “Rawhi Mushtaha, the head of the Hamas government in the Gaza Strip; Sameh al-Siraj, who held the security portfolio on Hamas’ political bureau and Hamas’ labor committee; and Sami Oudeh, commander of Hamas’ general security mechanism.”

  • The Lebanese ambassador to the UK, Rami Mortada, claimed that Hezbollah’s leadership had agreed to a proposed 21 day ceasefire shortly before “hotheads” of Israel blew up the diplomatic path to peace by assassinating leader Hassan Nasrallah. Mortada’s comments on Thursday support a previous assertion made by Lebanese foreign minister, Abdallah Bou Habib.

  • The Israeli army said its forces rescued an Iraqi Yazidi woman who was kidnapped by Islamic State (IS) militants and held captive in Gaza. Fawzia Amin Sido, 21, was freed in a months-long secret operation that involved Israel, the US and Iraq, officials said. More than 6,000 Yazidis were captured by IS militants from Sinjar region in Iraq in 2014, and some 2,600 are still missing.

Target of Beirut strikes presumed Nasrallah successor Hashem Safieddine, say Israeli media reports

According to Israeli media, Hachem Safieddine, the presumed next leader of Hezbollah, was the target of Israeli airstrikes on Dahiyeh, the southern suburbs of Beirut, midnight on Friday.

Axios’s Barak Ravid, citing Israeli sources, said that Safiedinne was the target of Friday night’s attack. Hezbollah had not commented on the claims.

Safieddine, the head of Hezbollah’s executive council, was said by analysts to be the most likely candidate to replace the late-secretary general of Hezbollah Hassan Nasrallah, killed by Israeli aistrikes in Dahiyeh last week.

Friday’s strikes sounded similar to the explosions that killed Nasrallah, with a series of loud explosions following one another rocking Beirut. Large, red smoke plumes were pictured emanating from the site of the airstrikes.

Israel reportedly used dozens of 2000-lb bunker buster bombs in its strike last week, leaving craters dozens of meters deep.

The Israeli military is issuing new evacuation warnings for civilians near a building in the Hadath Beirut neighbourhood.

Israel’s military spokesperson Avichay Adraee published a map alongside the announcement, warning civilians to distance themsevles at least 500 metres from the site.

Axios is reporting that the target for the latest Israeli strike in Beirut was Hashem Safieddine, a likely successor to Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah, who himself was killed in an Israeli strike last week.

IDF says it killed Hamas leader in Tulkarm

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said it killed the head of the Hamas network in Tulkarm in a strike on the occupied West Bank city late on Thursday.

An IDF statement identified the Hamas operative as Zahi Yaser Abd al-Razeq Oufi, and said he and several other Hamas members were killed in the strike.

At least 18 people were killed in the West Bank refugee camp of Tulkarm following an Israeli airstrike in the area, Palestinian health officials said.

Updated

37 people killed in Israeli strikes on Lebanon on Thursday, says health ministry

Lebanon’s health ministry said 37 people were killed and 151 wounded in Israeli strikes on the country in the past 24 hours.

The update came as new Israeli strikes were reported in Beirut’s southern suburbs.

Israeli strike hits near perimeter of Beirut airport - report

Here’s more on the latest Israeli strikes on Beirut, where massive explosions were reported around midnight local time.

At least one strike hit outside the perimeter of Beirut’s international airport, Reuters reported, citing a source in Lebanon’s ministry of transport and public works.

A source close to Hezbollah told AFP that Israel launched 11 consecutive strikes on Beirut’s southern suburbs.

The death toll in the Israeli military strike in Tulkarm refugee camp in the occupied West Bank has risen to 18, according to the Palestinian health ministry.

Huge blasts reported in Beirut

Massive explosions have been reported in Beirut, with multiple reports of fighters jets heard over the skies of the Lebanese capital.

Reuters is reporting that a series of loud explosions were heard near Beirut airport.

The news agency’s Timour Azhari shared video of what he said was the latest strikes, which he said appeared even more powerful than the Israeli strikes last Friday that killed Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah.

ITV’s Emma Murphy writes that the target of this latest strike must be significant given the scale of the attack.

Images are coming through the newswires showing smoke over Beirut’s southern suburbs after Israeli strikes on the Lebanese capital.

Imran Riza, the UN’s resident and humanitarian coordinator, urged respect for the rules of war between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon, noting that international humanitarian law requires that humanitarians be allowed to access people in need, and that civilian infrastructure and water systems be protected.

“This is what we call for when we’re saying respect the rules of war in this,” he told Reuters on Thursday.

Unfortunately, we are seeing a situation where we have to go back to everybody and advocate for these basics in terms of protecting civilians.

A senior UN official has said that civilians are bearing the brunt of a “truly catastrophic” situation in Lebanon.

Since Israel dramatically ramped up airstrikes in Lebanon more than a week ago, the pace of displacement had exceeded worst case scenarios, Imran Riza, the UN’s resident and humanitarian coordinator, told Reuters on Thursday.

“What we saw from September 23 on is truly catastrophic,” he said, referring to the day when more than 500 people were killed in a single day in Israeli airstrikes. He added:

The level of trauma, the level of fear amongst the population, has been extreme.

About 1.2 million people have been displaced by Israeli attacks on southern Lebanon, the Bekaa Valley, the southern suburbs of Beirut and other parts of the country. Riza said:

You’ve got people being displaced from one place to another, thinking they were going to a safe place, and then that being struck.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said it “precisely struck several weapons production sites” and Hezbollah infrastructure sites in Beirut on Thursday.

In a statement, the IDF said its fighter jets carried out strikes on 15 Hezbollah sites in Beirut.

It claimed it took “numerous steps” to “mitigate the risk of harming civilians”, including using “precision munitions” and aerial surveillance.

The US state department said about 250 Americans and their immediate families, including non-US citizens, have left Lebanon on government-organised contract flights in the past two days.

More than 130 US citizens and family members left Beirut on a flight to Istanbul, US state department spokesperson Matthew Miller said. In addition, more than 100 people left on a similar flight on Wednesday.

The US will continue to organise contract flights as long as the security situation in Lebanon is dire and there is demand, Miller said.

More than 6,000 US citizens have contacted the American embassy in Beirut seeking information about leaving since the conflict between Israel and Hezbollah began to escalate.

Some Americans, many of them dual US-Lebanese nationals and longtime residents of the country, may choose to stay, Miller said. He added that the US embassy is prepared to offer loans to those who choose to stay in Lebanon but need to relocate to a safer part of the country.

The Palestinian health ministry has raised the death toll from the Israeli military strike in Tulkarm refugee camp in the occupied West Bank to 16.

G7 leaders voice 'deep concern' over 'deteriorating situation' in the Middle East

G7 leaders have released a joint statement where they expressed “deep concern over the deteriorating situation in the Middle East” and called on regional players to “act responsibility and with restraint”.

In the statement, G7 leaders said they condemned “in the strongest terms” Iran’s military attack against Israel earlier this week, which they said “constitutes a serious threat to regional stability.”

“We unequivocally reiterate our commitment to the security of Israel,” G7 leaders said, adding that Iran’s “seriously destabilising” actions in the region “must stop.” The statement said:

A dangerous cycle of attacks and retaliation risks fuelling uncontrollable escalation in the Middle East, which is in no one’s interest.

At least 14 killed by Israeli strike in Tulkarm refugee camp, says Palestinian health ministry

At least 14 Palestinians were killed in an Israeli strike on the Tulkarm refugee camp in the occupied West Bank, the Palestinian health ministry said on Thursday.

A video posted to social media appeared to show the aftermath of the Israeli strike:

As we reported earlier, the Israeli military has confirmed it conducted a strike in Tulkarm, without elaborating.

Updated

UN peacekeepers remain in place in southern Lebanon despite orders from the Israeli military to move, Unifil chief Jean-Pierre Lacroix told reporters on Thursday.

The UN peacekeeping body in Lebanon (Unifil) is mandated by the UN security council to help the Lebanese army keep the area free of weapons and armed personnel other than those of the Lebanese state.

Earlier this week, the Israeli military asked Unifil to prepare to relocate more than 5 km (3 miles) from the border between Israel and Lebanon, known as the Blue Line, “as soon as possible, in order to maintain your safety,” Reuters reported.

“The peacekeepers are currently staying in their position, all of them,” Lacroix told reporters.

The parties have an obligation to respect the safety of and security of peacekeepers, and I want to insist on that.

He added that Unifil was continuing to liaise with both countries and that it was “the only channel of communication” between them.

At least five killed in Israeli strike on occupied West Bank city - report

At least five people have been killed in an Israeli military strike on the occupied West Bank city of Tulkarm on Thursday, according to Palestinian news agency Wafa.

Several others were injured after an Israeli airstrike on a popular cafe in the Tulkarm refugee camp in the occupied West Bank, Wafa reported.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) confirmed that it carried out an airstrike with a fighter jet in Tulkarm.

The IDF said the strike came amid a joint operation in the area with Shin Bet, and that further details will be provided later.

Updated

Israel issues new evacuation orders for Beirut's southern suburbs

The Israeli military has ordered Lebanese civilians near two buildings in Dahiyeh, in the southern suburb of Beirut, to evacuate immediately ahead of airstrikes.

Israel’s military spokesperson Avichay Adraee published maps alongside the announcement, warning civilians to distance themsevles at least 500 metres from the sites.

Israel’s ambassador to the UN said the country has “a lot of options” when it comes to striking back at Iran in response to Tuesday’s missile attacks.

Danny Danon told CNN on Thursday:

We have a lot of options … so it’s (up to) us to decide where and when we want to attack, but they are vulnerable. They know that.

On Wednesday, Danon told the outlet that Israel would “not sit idly by” after the Iranian attack, adding that Israel would have a “very strong, painful” response.

Danon said Israel did not want to see escalation or war but insisted that it will retaliate against Iran’s large-scale rocket launches. He added:

We would have to make it a calculated response because we don’t want to see full war with Iran. And believe me, they also don’t want to see it. We have shown our capabilities when we fought Hamas in Gaza, and we are fighting Hezbollah in Lebanon. They better look at what happened in Beirut and in Gaza before they start a war with us.

Here are some of the latest images sent to us over the news wires from Lebanon, Gaza and Israel.

Iran summoned the German and Austrian ambassadors on Thursday after their governments rebuked Tehran over its missile attack on Israel earlier this week, Iranian state media reported.

The move was in response to the “unacceptable measures” by Germany and Austria who summoned Iran’s envoys over Tuesday’s missile strike, AFP reported, citing Iran’s state-run Irna news agency.

The Iranian attack on Israel was a “legitimate, responsible and effective response in punishing,” Iran’s foreign ministry said.

Israeli army says it has smoke shells that contain white phosphorus but doesn't say if they were used in Beirut

The Israeli army has said it does possess smoke shells that contain white phosphorus but did not say if it used phosphorus bombs in the recent attack in Beirut that killed nine people.

The Israeli strikes in the early hours of Thursday were the closest yet to downtown Beirut. In the hours after the attack, residents reported a sulfur-like smell, AP reported.

Lebanon’s state-run national news agency accused Israel of using phosphorus bombs, which can cause severe burns and could violate international law.

In a statement, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said:

The primary smoke shells used by the IDF do not contain white phosphorus. Like many Western militaries, the IDF also possesses smoke shells that include white phosphorus, which are lawful under international law.

Human rights groups have previously accused Israel of using white phosphorus incendiary shells on towns and villages in southern Lebanon.

Israel has also been accused of using white phosphorus munitions in their military operations in Gaza.

Updated

The airstrikes started just before noon. The injured and the dead quickly followed. As the ground in the southern Lebanese town of Marjayoun began to shake from the relentless approach of Israeli bombs, Shoshan Mazraani let her muscle memory take over.

As the emergency room director of its public hospital, she was well versed in the grim logistics of the triage procedures that follow a bombing. Then after five hours of gruelling work, the din of the emergency room was interrupted by a long whistle.

Doctors turned their heads, a reflex after nearly a year of war. Then a blast, the doors of the hospital blown open, the windows shattering and cracks spreading across the hospital walls. Mazraani said:

When I heard the rocket, I thought it was coming to hit us. Then there was a tremendous pressure in the hospital, the doors buckled from it. I really thought the rocket had impacted us.

Two airstrikes had landed just metres from the hospital on Monday last week, damaging its interior and forcing medical workers to stop their work until they could figure out if they were under attack.

The airstrikes took Mazraani by surprise. Marjayoun, colloquially referred to as the beginning of the “Christian corridor” by UN peacekeepers in south Lebanon, had remained relatively untouched by fighting. As late as July, residents of the town could be seen going on scenic jogs, UN armoured personnel carriers passing them by and plumes of smoke rising from the hills just a few miles away.

Marjayoun’s hospital, in particular, was thought to be safe. But on 23 September, when Israel began a punishing aerial offensive on Lebanon that has so far killed 700 and wounded more than 2,000, healthcare workers suddenly found themselves at risk.

Read the full story here: Lebanese healthcare workers fearful as growing numbers killed in strikes

Dr Nadine Jawad, the daughter of the Lebanese American killed in his hometown of Nabatieh, Lebanon, yesterday, Dr Kamel Ahmad Jawad, said as part of a statement that was sent to the Guardian:

“In his last days, he chose to…help the elderly, disabled, injured, and those who simply couldn’t financially afford to flee. He served as their guardian, provided them with food, mattresses, and other comforts, and anonymously paid off their debts. I would often ask him if he was scared, and he repeatedly told me that we should not be scared because he is doing what he loves the most: helping others live in the land he loved the most.”

Nadine emphasized that her father was dedicated to helping the oppressed around the world and, despite being surrounded by Israeli missiles, he remained calm and dedicated to supporting people in need.

Her father was in Lebanon taking care of his elderly mother, according to the Detroit News. His friend Hamzah Raza and local Dearborn groups called him “one of the kindest and most generous humans,” Reuters reported.

Relatives of the Lebanese-American father and doctor from Dearborn, Michigan, Kamel Ahmad Jawad, have issued a statement about their loved one, who was killed in an Israeli air strike on southern Lebanon yesterday.

Jawad’s daughter, Dr Nadine Jawad, shared in a statement that her father decided to stay near the main hospital in his hometown of Nabatieh to help his community when he was struck.

A year of conflict between Israel and Hamas has resulted in a “devastating impact on the economy” in the occupied West Bank and Gaza, the International Monetary Fund said today, including a nearly 90% drop in Gaza’s Gross Domestic Product.

Preliminary official estimates indicate an 86% decline in GDP in the first half of 2024” in Gaza, said International Monetary Fund communications chief Julie Kozack, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reports.

Kozack added that Gaza’s:

“Civilian population faces dire socioeconomic conditions, a humanitarian crisis and insufficient aid delivery [and in the West Bank] already grim prospects have further deteriorated, and preliminary official data indicate a 25% decline in GDP in the first half of 2024.”

Summary of the day so far

Here’s a recap of the latest developments:

  • Israel’s military ordered residents of more than 20 towns in south Lebanon to evacuate their homes immediately on Thursday, signaling that it may widen a ground operation launched earlier this week against Hezbollah. Israel has told people to leave Nabatieh, a provincial capital, and other communities north of the Litani River, which formed the northern edge of the UN-declared buffer zone. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said “Hezbollah’s activities force the IDF to act against it forcefully” and that anybody moving southward would be in danger. Israel has previously ordered 52 other villages inside Lebanon to evacuate.

  • Multiple airstrikes were heard in Beirut on Thursday afternoon, with one of them reportedly hitting the office of Hezbollah’s media department in Dahiyeh, the southern suburbs of Beirut. An official from the media office said they were safe, despite the blast. Israel said it had targeted Hezbollah’s intelligence operation. The Lebanese Red Cross said its convoy accompanied by the Lebanese Army was struck while evacuating wounded from Taybeh, a border-village in southern Lebanon.

  • Israeli strikes on a central Beirut medical centre killed at least nine people in the early hours on Thursday. The Israeli strike hit a medical centre belonging to the Hezbollah-linked Islamic Health Organisation in the early hours of Thursday. The attack was the second airstrike on central Beirut this week, with most strikes having previously been confined to suburbs in the southern suburbs. At least seven people are known to have died in the strike on Hezbollah-linked Islamic Health Organisation in the early hours of Thursday. The attack was the second Israeli airstrike on central Beirut this week. The EU’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell, described the Israeli strike as a “violation of international humanitarian law”.

  • Nearly 2,000 people have been killed, including 127 children, and 9,384 injured since the start of Israeli attacks on Lebanon over the last year, the country’s health ministry said on Thursday. More than 1.2 million Lebanese people have been displaced by Israeli attacks. Lebanon’s health minister said more than 40 rescuers and firefighters have been killed by Israeli attacks over the last three days. The World Health Organization will not be able to deliver a large planned shipment of trauma and medical supplies to Lebanon on Friday due to flight restrictions, its chief said on Thursday.

  • Hezbollah also carried out new strikes, targeting what it called Israel’s “Sakhnin base” for military industries in Haifa Bay on the Mediterranean coast of northern Israel with a salvo of rockets. At least eight Israeli soldiers have been killed in clashes with Hezbollah in southern Lebanon.

  • The Lebanese army said that it returned fire at Israeli forces after one of its soldiers was killed in an Israeli strike, marking the first time that the Lebanese army participated in the fighting against Israel. The soldier was killed when a Lebanese Red Cross convoy accompanied by the Lebanese Army was struck while evacuating wounded from Taybeh, a border-village in southern Lebanon.

  • Joe Biden, the US president, said he was “discussing” possible Israeli strikes on Iranian oil sites in response to Tehran’s missile attack on Tuesday. His comments quickly sent oil prices soaring. Asked if he would “allow” Israel to retaliate against Iran, Biden said on Thursday that “we don’t ’allow’ Israel, we advise Israel. And there is nothing going to happen today.” On Wednesday, Biden said he would not support an Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear sites.

  • Iran has warned Washington that any country that aids an Israeli attack will be deemed an Iranian target. In a statement issued by Iran’s mission at the UN in New York, Iran warned that a large Israeli strike will lead to attacks on Israeli infrastructure and that “should any country render assistance to the aggressor, it shall likewise be deemed an accomplice and a legitimate target.” The warnings came as the Iranian president, Masoud Pezeshkian, sought assurances from Gulf States in Doha that they would remain neutral in the event of any joint Israeli-US attack in Iran.

  • The head of the UN’s agency for Palestinian refugees (Unrwa) said three of the UN body’s schools were hit in Gaza in the past two days alone, killing at least 21 people. Israeli forces stepped up their attacks on the Gaza Strip overnight and into Wednesday, killing at least 70 people in strikes on a school and an orphanage sheltering displaced people, according to Palestinian media and officials. “Schools used to be a safe haven for learning, they have now turned into hell for far too many,” Unrwa chief Philippe Lazzarini said on Thursday.

  • The death toll in Gaza has risen to 41,788 reported fatalities with 96,794 people wounded, according to the latest figures by territory’s health ministry on Thursday. At least 90 Palestinians were killed and 169 others injured in eight attacks by Israel over the last 24 hours, Palestinian news agency Wafa reported.

  • The Israeli military said it killed a Hezbollah commander who was responsible for a rocket attack on the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights that killed 12 children and teenagers on a football field in July. The IDF said Khader Shahabiya was killed in an airstrike on Wednesday. The attack on Majdal Shams village, a predominantly Druze village, killed 12 children between the ages of 10 and 16 as they were playing football and wounded dozens more.

  • Israel’s military also announced that in a strike “approximately three months ago” it believes it killed three senior Hamas figures. It named them as “Rawhi Mushtaha, the head of the Hamas government in the Gaza Strip; Sameh al-Siraj, who held the security portfolio on Hamas’ political bureau and Hamas’ labor committee; and Sami Oudeh, commander of Hamas’ general security mechanism.”

  • The Lebanese ambassador to the UK, Rami Mortada, claimed that Hezbollah’s leadership had agreed to a proposed 21 day ceasefire shortly before “hotheads” of Israel blew up the diplomatic path to peace by assassinating leader Hassan Nasrallah. Mortada’s comments on Thursday support a previous assertion made by Lebanese foreign minister, Abdallah Bou Habib.

  • The Israeli army said its forces rescued an Iraqi Yazidi woman who was kidnapped by Islamic State (IS) militants and held captive in Gaza. Fawzia Amin Sido, 21, was freed in a months-long secret operation that involved Israel, the US and Iraq, officials said. More than 6,000 Yazidis were captured by IS militants from Sinjar region in Iraq in 2014, and some 2,600 are still missing.

  • Among the favourites for this year’s Nobel Peace Prize are the UN’s agency for Palestinian refugees (Unrwa), the international court of justice (ICJ), and the UN’s secretary general, António Guterres, according to a report.

The Israeli army said its forces rescued an Iraqi Yazidi woman who was kidnapped by Islamic State (IS) militants and held captive in Gaza.

Fawzia Amin Sido, 21, was reunited with her family in northern Iraq on Wednesday, according to Iraqi authorities. She was freed in a months-long secret operation that involved Israel, the US and Iraq, officials said.

Iraqi officials had been in contact with her for months and passed on her information to US officials, who arranged for her exit from Gaza with the help of Israel, a source told Reuters. Iraq and Israel do not have any diplomatic ties.

The rescue operation involved several attempts that failed due to the difficult security situation resulting from Israel’s war in Gaza, Silwan Sinjaree, chief of staff of Iraq’s foreign minister, told the news agency.

According to the Israeli army, Sido was abducted by IS militants when she was 11 and sold and kidnapped to Gaza. The Israeli military said that her captor, a Palestinian who belonged to Hamas, was killed during the Gaza war, apparently by an Israeli airstrike.

The Israeli military said it had coordinated with the US embassy in Jerusalem and “other international actors” in the operation to free Sido. A US state department spokesperson said the US on Tuesday “helped to safely evacuate from Gaza a young Yezidi woman to be reunited with her family in Iraq”.

More than 6,000 Yazidis were captured by IS militants from Sinjar region in Iraq in 2014, with many sold into sexual slavery or trained as child soldiers and taken across borders, including to Turkey and Syria.

More than 3,500 have been rescued or freed, according to Iraqi authorities. Some 2,600 are still missing, many feared dead.

Updated

Masoud Pezeshkian, Iran’s president, was in Doha, Qatar for a wider conference, but his foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, held talks both with foreign ministers from the six state Gulf Cooperation Council and with the Saudi foreign minister on the sidelines of the summit.

The Saudi foreign minister, Prince Faisal bin Farhan, said:

We intend to close the book on disagreements with Iran forever and develop relations between us like two friends.

His remarks underline recent Saudi assurances that there will be no Saudi-Israel normalisation deal without Israel’s agreement to a Palestinian state.

But the Gulf states will be concerned by reports, apparently confirmed by Joe Biden, that Israel is in discussions with the US whether it may target Iran oil installations, a move that could have a knock on effect on oil exports throughout the region.

In a joint press conference with Pezeshkian, the Emir of Qatar, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani, said the crisis in the Middle East is a “collective genocide” and that his country has always warned of Israel’s “impunity.”

It has become crystal clear that what is happening is genocide, in addition to turning the Gaza Strip into an area unfit for human habitation, in preparation for displacement.

Pezeshkian said Iran had been forced to react due to Israel’s behaviour. He said:

Since I was elected as the president, I have been trying to say that we are looking for peace and tranquility, because no country or region can develop with war.

He restated his grievance that he had been misled when he agreed not to respond to the assassination of Hamas leader, Ismail Haniyeh, in Tehran in June due to claims that Israel was close to signing a Gaza peace deal.

The broad hints of an Iranian counter-escalation especially if its nuclear sites are struck raise issues of whether Iran would be willing to hit what it regards as Israel’s most sensititve nuclear sites.

The warnings came as the Iranian president, Masoud Pezeshkian, sought assurances from Gulf States in Doha that they would remain neutral in the event of any joint Israeli-US attack in Iran.

Majid Takht-Ravanchi, the political deputy at Iran’s ministry of foreign affairs, also held a briefing with international diplomats in Tehran to warn them if Israel challenged Iranian sovereignty again, Israel will receive “a crushing and instructive response”.

Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei will lead Friday prayers in Tehran while his foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, will travel to Beirut to discuss if there is any possibility of reviving a ceasefire.

Iran struck Israeli military bases on Tuesday in response to the killing of the Hezbollah chief, Hassan Nasrallah, in Beirut on Friday, and Israel has vowed a response.

Updated

Iran warns US that any country that helps Israeli attack will be a 'legitimate target'

Iran has warned Washington that a large Israeli strike will lead to attacks on Israeli infrastructure and any country that aids such an attack will be deemed an Iranian target.

In a statement issued by Iran’s mission at the UN in New York, Iran said:

Should any country render assistance to the aggressor, it shall likewise be deemed an accomplice and a legitimate target. We advise countries to refrain from entangling themselves in the conflict between the Israeli regime and Iran and to distance themselves from the fray.

Iran also stressed no messages to “aggressors” will be sent except through the Swiss diplomats, the country designated to transmit Iranian messsages to the US. There had been claims that Iran was using Qatar as an intermediary with the US.

The Qatari emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani, affirmed his country's “full support” for Lebanon against the “brutal attacks they are being subjected to”.

Posting to X on Thursday, he said he had ordered “rapid action and all necessary resources” to provide humanitarian and relief support to “all displaced people and those affected by this aggression.” He added:

The failure of the international community to stop the war on Gaza was a green light to expand the conflict.

Among the favourites for this year’s Nobel Peace Prize are the UN’s agency for Palestinian refugees (Unrwa), the international court of justice (ICJ), and the UN’s secretary general, António Guterres, according to a report.

In a year marked by the wars in Gaza, Ukraine and Sudan, the Norwegian Nobel Committee may want to focus on humanitarian actors helping to relieve civilian suffering. Henrik Urdal, director of the Peace Research Institute Oslo, told Reuters:

Unrwa could be one such candidate. They’re doing extremely important work for civilian Palestinians that experience the sufferings of the war in Gaza.

The UN’s chief or its top court, the ICJ, are other possible contenders, Asle Sveen, a historian of the Nobel Peace Prize, told the news agency.

Guterres is the top symbol of the UN. The ICJ’s most important duty is to ensure that international humanitarian law is applied globally.

Gaza's schools have 'turned into hell', says Unrwa chief after Israeli strikes

The head of the UN’s agency for Palestinian refugees (Unrwa) said three of the UN body’s schools were hit in Gaza in the past two days alone, killing at least 21 people.

Israeli forces stepped up their attacks on the Gaza Strip overnight and into Wednesday, killing at least 70 people in strikes on a school and an orphanage sheltering displaced people, according to Palestinian media and officials.

At least 51 people were killed and 82 wounded in an Israeli attack in Khan Younis that began early on Wednesday, Gaza’s health ministry said. Records at the European hospital show that seven women and 12 children, as young as 22 months old, were among those killed.

Another 23 people, including two children, were killed in separate strikes across Gaza, according to local hospitals.

Unrwa chief Philippe Lazzarini said that the three schools that were attacked over the past two days housed more than 20,000 displaced people.

He said that more than 140 Unrwa schools have come under attacks since 7 October, the majority of them “while people were taking refuge in them under the UN flag”. Lazzarini added:

Schools used to be a safe haven for learning, they have now turned into hell for far too many. Schools cannot be used for any military purposes by anyone. Schools are not a target. These are some of the basic rules of war blatantly disregarded.

The latest figures by the Gaza health ministry state that at least 41,788 people have been killed and 96,794 others wounded in Israeli strikes since 7 October.

Updated

Gulf Arab states have sought to reassure Iran of their neutrality amid rising concerns that a wider escalation in violence between Tehran and Israel could threaten their oil facilities, according to a report.

Ministers from Gulf Arab states and Iran attended a meeting of Asian nations hosted by Qatar this week, during which urgent de-escalation was at the top of the agenda for all the discussions, sources told Reuters.

Axios reported yesterday that Israeli officials are considering targeting oil production facilities inside Iran and other strategic sites as a retaliation to Tuesday’s missile attack.

Iran has not threatened to attack Gulf oil facilities but it has warned that if “Israel supporters” intervene directly their interests in the region would be targeted. Ali Shihabi, a Saudi commentator close to the Royal Court, told Reuters:

The Gulf states think it’s unlikely that Iran will strike their oil facilities, but the Iranians are dropping hints they might from unofficial sources. It’s a tool the Iranians have against the U.S. and the global economy.

The message from the Gulf Cooperation Council – made up of the UAE, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar and Kuwait – to Iran is “please de-escalate”, he said.

Israeli military says it killed Hezbollah commander responsible for deadly football pitch strike

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said it killed a Hezbollah commander who was responsible for a rocket attack on the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights that killed 12 children and teenagers on a football field in July.

The IDF said Khader Shahabiya was killed in an airstrike on Wednesday. It said he was responsible for the rocket attack in July, as well as numerous anti-tank missile and rocket attacks on IDF posts.

The attack on Majdal Shams village, a predominantly Druze village, killed 12 children between the ages of 10 and 16 as they were playing football and wounded dozens more.

Updated

Joe Biden’s latest comments came a day after the US president said he would not support an Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear sites.

US officials have been locked in urgent talks with their Israeli counterparts on their country’s response since Iran’s missile attack on Tuesday.

There is general acceptance in Washington that Israel will carry out a military response that would almost certain to go further than the only previous Israeli airstrikes against Iran, when missiles were fired at an air defence installation near Isfahan, after a previous Iranian aerial attack in April this year.

But the Biden administration fears that a major Israeli response, particularly one targeting Iran’s nuclear facilities, could trigger further escalation that could ultimately draw in US forces, and potentially lead to an Iranian decision to try to build nuclear weapons.

Second only to nuclear sites in terms of their devastating impact would be a broad attack on Iran’s oil installations, as well as airstrikes on military bases, or targeted assassinations, which Israel has used widely in the region.

Updated

Here’s more from Joe Biden, who was speaking to reporters at the White House when he was asked if he would “allow” Israel to retaliate against Iran. The US president said:

First of all, we don’t ’allow’ Israel, we advise Israel. And there is nothing going to happen today.

Biden says he is 'discussing' possible Israeli strikes on Iran oil facilities

Joe Biden, the US president, said he was “discussing” possible Israeli strikes on Iranian oil sites in response to Tehran’s missile attack on Tuesday.

Here’s a clip, from the BBC’s Faisal Islam:

As Islam notes, Biden’s comments quickly sent oil prices soaring.

WTI, the US contract, rose by as much as 5% before paring back some gains to sit at about $73 per barrel while Brent, the international benchmark, rose around four percent to $76.81, AFP reported.

Dozens of health workers killed in Lebanon over past 24 hours, says WHO

Here’s more from the World Health Organization’s director general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, who was speaking during an online briefing on Thursday.

At least 28 on-duty medics have been killed in the past 24 hours in Lebanon, he said. A total of nearly 2,000 people have been killed, including 127 children, and 9,384 injured since the start of Israeli attacks on Lebanon over the last year, the country’s health ministry said.

WHO’s representative in Lebanon, Dr Abdinasir Abubakar, said all of the healthcare workers killed in the past day had been on duty, helping with the wounded, Reuters reported. He added:

Hospitals have been already evacuated. I think what I can say for now is the capacity for mass casualty management exists, but it’s just a matter of time until the system actually reaches its limit.

Tedros called for stronger protections for health workers:

Many (other) health workers are not reporting to duty and fled the areas where they work due to bombardments … This is severely limiting the provision of mass trauma management and continuity of health services.

The UN health agency will not be able to deliver a large planned shipment of trauma and medical supplies to the country on Friday due to flight restrictions, he added.

WHO’s representative in Lebanon Dr Abdinasir Abubakar told the media briefing that all of the healthcare workers killed in the past day had been on duty, helping with the injured.

As we reported in an earlier post, a total of nearly 2,000 people have been killed, including 127 children, and 9,384 injured since the start of Israeli attacks on Lebanon over the last year, the country’s health ministry said.

At least 28 health workers in Lebanon have been killed in the last 24 hours, the World Health Organization (WHO) chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has told reporters. Speaking at a press conference, he was quoted by BBC News as saying that many health workers are also “not reporting to duty as they fled the areas where they work due to bombardment”.

Updated

'Phase of unilateral self-restraint has ended', Iran reportedly tells US

An Iranian source has told Al Jazeera that Iran has sent a message to the US, via Qatar, saying that “the phase of unilateral self-restraint has ended”.

It also reportedly said any Israeli attack would meet an “unconventional response” that includes targeting Israeli infrastructure.

The indirect message stressed that Iran does not want a regional war, the source told Al Jazeera. The US president, Joe Biden, who has insisted on Israel’s “right to defend itself”, has publicly repeated his call for a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah.

Biden, in the last months of his presidency, has failed to exercise much US leverage – as Israel’s biggest arms supplier and diplomatic shield at the UN – over Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Israeli attacks have killed 1,974 people in Lebanon since last October, health minister says

Lebanon’s health minister has said over 40 rescuers and firefighters have been killed by Israeli attacks over the last three days.

Firass Abiad said 97 “paramedics and firefighters” had been killed and 188 injured since 8 October 2023, when cross-border fighting between Israel and Hezbollah escalated after the Hamas-led 7 October attack on southern Israel.

Since last October, 1,974 people have been killed by the Israeli military, including 127 children, Abiad said, adding that more than 9,350 have been injured.

Updated

Summary of the day so far …

It is approaching 5pm in Beirut, Tel Aviv and Gaza City. Here are the latest headlines …

  • Multiple airstrikes were heard in Beirut on Thursday afternoon, with one of them reportedly hitting the office of Hezbollah’s media department in Dahiyeh, the southern suburbs of Beirut. An official from the media office said they were safe, despite the blast. Israel said it had targeted Hezbollah’s intelligence operation

  • The EU’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell, has described Israel’s strike on Beirut which is now known to have killed paramedics, as a “violation of international humanitarian law”. At least seven people are known to have died in the strike on Hezbollah-linked Islamic Health Organisation in the early hours of Thursday. The attack was the second Israeli airstrike on central Beirut this week

  • Israel’s military has issued another order to residents of neighbouring Lebanon to flee their homes, including from the city of Nabatieh, one of Lebanon’s largest centres of population in the south. As well as the city, more than 20 other locations are specified. In the message Israel repeated its call that “Hezbollah’s activities force the IDF to act against it forcefully” and that anybody moving southward would be in danger. Israel has previously ordered 52 other villages inside Lebanon to evacuate

  • The Lebanese caretaker environment minister Nasser Yassin has said the number of people displaced in Lebanon has exceeded 1.2 million. He said “We are racing against time to house them, and there are now more than 870 shelters”

  • Hezbollah has claimed that it confronted an attempt by Israeli forces to cross into Lebanon at the Fatima Gate, to the west of the Israeli community of Metula. There has been no comment on the claim from Israel’s military

  • The Lebanese army said that it returned fire at Israeli forces after one of its soldiers was killed in an Israeli strike, marking the first time that the Lebanese army participated in the fighting against Israel. The soldier was killed when a Lebanese Red Cross convoy accompanied by the Lebanese Army was struck while evacuating wounded from Taybeh, a border-village in southern Lebanon

  • Lebanon’s transport minister, Ali Hamieh, has said that all border crossings were under government monitoring after Israel accused Hezbollah of smuggling weapons from Syria through the Masnaa border crossing

  • The Lebanese ambassador to the UK, Rami Mortada, claimed on Thursday that Hezbollah’s leadership had agreed to a proposed 21 day ceasefire shortly before “hotheads” of Israel blew up the diplomatic path to peace by assassinating leader Hassan Nasrallah. Mortada’s comments support a previous assertion made by Lebanese foreign minister Abdallah Bou Habib

  • Spain’s defence ministry has said that its two planes sent to Beirut to evacuate Spanish civilians have taken off and are heading to an airbase near Madrid. Russia has evacuated 60 nationals from Beirut

  • Syria’s state-controlled news agency Sana has reported that Syrian air defences have been confronting “hostile targets” in the skies near Damascus

  • France has said Israel Katz’s announcement yesterday that Israel’s foreign minister was declaring António Guterres “persona non grata” was “unjustified”

  • Israel’s military has announced that in a strike “approximately three months ago” it believes it killed three senior Hamas figures. It named the most senior of them as “Rawhi Mushtaha, the head of the Hamas government in the Gaza Strip”

  • The death toll in Gaza has risen to 41,788 reported fatalities with 96,794 people wounded, according to the latest figures from the Hamas-led health authority in the territory

Israel has claimed that one of its strike on the southern suburbs of Beirut was aimed at “targets belonging to Hezbollah’s Intelligence Headquarters in Beirut, including terror operatives belonging to the unit.”

The claims have not been independently verified.

Lebanese army says it has returned fire at Israel for first time

William Christou is reporting for the Guardian from Beirut

The Lebanese army said that it returned fire at Israeli forces after one of its soldiers was killed in an Israeli strike, marking the first time that the Lebanese army participated in the fighting against Israel.

Until now, Hezbollah has been fighting Israel and the Lebanese army has made it clear that it is not a party to the conflict. The Lebanese army has denied claims it pulled back its forces from the border ahead of Israel’s ground invasion of Lebanon on Monday night.

The Lebanese army said on a post on X that the army “returned fire at the sources of fire” after Israel targeted an army installation in the Lebanese border village of Bint Jbeil.

It’s not believed the exchange will lead to further fighting between Israel and the Lebanese army. The Lebanese state has called for an end to fighting between Hezbollah and Israel and says it does not want a war.

Updated

Israel’s foreign minister, Israel Katz, yesterday declared UN secretary-general Antonio Guterres persona non grata and banned him from entering Israel.

“Anyone who cannot unequivocally condemn Iran’s heinous attack on Israel, as almost every country in the world has done, does not deserve to step foot on Israeli soil,” Katz wrote on X.

The foreign ministry claimed the decision was a reaction to Guterres’s response after Iran’s missile attack on Tuesday, “in which he failed to mention Iran by name and did not unequivocally condemn its grave aggression”.

France has now responded to Israel’s move, saying the decision was “unjustified”.

“France regrets the unjustified, serious and counter-productive decision taken by Israel to declare the secretary general of the United Nations, Mr Antonio Guterres, persona non grata,” the French foreign ministry said in a statement on Thursday.

Updated

Lebanon’s transport minister, Ali Hamieh, has said that all border crossings were under government monitoring after Israel accused Hezbollah of smuggling weapons from Syria through the Masnaa border crossing.

Col Avichay Adraee, the IDF’s Arabic-language spokesperson, said that this past week, the IDF struck a truck ferrying “sensitive weapons” to Hezbollah via one of the crossings between Syria and Lebanon. This claim has not been independently verified by the Guardian.

Updated

Spain’s defence ministry has said that its two planes sent to Beirut to evacuate Spanish civilians have taken off and are heading to an airbase near Madrid, the Associated Press reports.

The country’s defence minister, Margarita Robles, said that between 400 and 500 of the around 1,000 Spaniards registered as living in Lebanon are being airlifted out.

Like many other governments, including the UK, Australia and Canada, the Spanish government has urged all its citizens to leave and is offering to assist those who say they want to be evacuated.

Spain also has 676 soldiers in Lebanon deployed under a UN peacekeeping mission. Robles said that the troops are staying in the country until otherwise ordered by the UN command.

Updated

Middle East's biggest airline halts Iran, Iraq and Jordan flights over 'regional unrest'

Emirates airlines, the Middle East’s biggest airline, has cancelled flights to Iraq, Iran and Jordan for three days over what it called “regional unrest” amid Israel’s invasion of Lebanon.

“Emirates is cancelling all flights to/from Iraq (Basra and Baghdad), Iran (Tehran), and Jordan (Amman) on 4th and 5th October due to regional unrest,” said the Dubai-based airline, which also halted services to the destinations on Thursday.

The Emirates airline had previously announced cancellations between Dubai and Beirut until 8 October, as several other carriers put services to the region on hold.

On Tuesday, German airline group Lufthansa said it was suspending flights to Beirut up to and including 30 November.

Lufthansa group flights to Tel Aviv will be cancelled until 31 October, while trips to Tehran are closed until 14 October.

Lebanese officials said overnight Israeli air strikes on central Beirut killed at least nine people. Israel began a ground invasion of the southern part of the country this week, marking the first time Israeli troops have launched sustained operations in Lebanon since 2006.

Updated

Multiple Israeli airstrikes heard in Beirut's southern suburbs

William Christou reports from Beirut for the Guardian

Multiple airstrikes were heard in Beirut on Thursday afternoon, with one of them reportedly hitting the office of Hezbollah’s media department in Dahiyeh, the southern suburbs of Beirut.

An official from the media office said they were safe, despite the blast. Another airstrike had reportedly struck Kayfoun, a village southeast of Beirut in Mount Lebanon, an area which previously was thought to be outside the area which Israel would target.

Earlier Israel’s military issued evacuation orders to Lebanese residents in more than 20 towns and villages, including the southern city of Nabatieh.

Updated

Israel’s army radio reports new Israeli strikes on the southern suburbs of Beirut.

More details soon …

The EU’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell, has described Israel’s strike on Beirut which is now known to have killed paramedics, as a “violation of international humanitarian law”.

In a post to social media, he wrote:

IDF targeted once again healthcare workers overnight, in central Beirut: seven people including paramedics were killed. Not only civilians are victims of attacks, including in densely populated areas, but they are deprived of emergency care. I condemn this violation of IHL.

The Israeli strike last night hit a medical centre belonging to the Hezbollah-linked Islamic Health Organisation in the early hours of Thursday. The attack was the second airstrike on central Beirut this week, with most strikes having previously been confined to suburbs in the city’s south.

Tass reports that Russia has evacuated 60 nationals from Beirut. It said the flight, arranged by Russia’s emergencies ministry, delivered humanitarian aid to Lebanon before picking up the passengers.

William Christou reports from Beirut for the Guardian

A Lebanese Red Cross convoy accompanied by the Lebanese Army was struck while evacuating wounded from Taybeh, a border-village in southern Lebanon.

Four Lebanese Red Cross volunteers were injured, according to a statement by the Lebanese Red Cross. The Lebanese Red Cross said they had coordinated their movements with UN peacekeepers on the border but were targeted nonetheless. One Lebanese soldier was killed and another wounded, according to a statement by the Lebanese army, which blamed Israel for the attack.

Lebanese soldier killed by Israeli strike while on evacuation and rescue mission

Lebanon’s army has announced that one soldier has been killed, and another wounded, by an Israeli strike.

It said the soldiers were engaged in “carrying out an evacuation and rescue mission with the participation of the Lebanese Red Cross” in Taybeh in southern Lebanon.

Israel has repeatedly claimed it is targeting Hezbollah in Lebanon.

Syrian media: air defences confronting 'hostile targets' in skies near Damascus

Syria’s state-controlled news agency Sana has reported that Syrian air defences have been confronting “hostile targets” in the skies near Damascus.

More details soon …

The death toll in Gaza has risen to 41,788 reported fatalities with 96,794 people wounded, according to the latest figures from the Hamas-led health authority in the territory.

Palestinian news agency Wafa reports at least 90 Palestinians were killed and 169 others injured in eight attacks by Israel over the last 24 hours.

It has not been possible for journalists to independently verify the casualty figures being issued during the conflict.

There are unconfirmed reports that explosions have been heard in the countryside around Damascus in Syria.

More details soon …

Israel orders more Lebanese residents to flee their homes, including from the city of Nabatieh

Israel’s military has issued another order to residents of neighbouring Lebanon to flee their homes, including from the city of Nabatieh, one of Lebanon’s largest centres of population in the south.

As well as the city, more than 20 other locations are specified. In the message Israel repeated its call that “Hezbollah’s activities force the IDF to act against it forcefully” and that anybody moving southward would be in danger.

Israel has previously ordered 52 other villages inside Lebanon to evacuate.

Earlier Lebanon’s caretaker environment minister said that 1.2 million people have already been displaced from their homes after Israel stepped up its air attacks on Lebanon, which it claims are targeting Hezbollah.

Here are some of the latest images sent to us over the news wires from Israel and Lebanon.

In statements in the last few minutes, Hezbollah has claimed that it confronted an attempt by Israeli forces to cross into Lebanon at the Fatima Gate, to the west of the Israeli community of Metula. There has been no comment on the claim from Israel’s military.

Israel, meanwhile, has claimed via military spokesperson Avichay Adraee that Hezbollah has been smuggling weapons into Lebanon from Syria via the Masnaa border crossing.

The claims have not been independently verified.

Israel announces that three months ago it killed three senior Hamas leaders in Gaza with airstrike

Israel’s military has just announced that in a strike “approximately three months ago” it believes it killed three senior Hamas figures.

It names them as “Rawhi Mushtaha, the head of the Hamas government in the Gaza Strip; Sameh al-Siraj, who held the security portfolio on Hamas’ political bureau and Hamas’ labor committee; and Sami Oudeh, commander of Hamas’ general security mechanism.”

In the statement Israel claims that “Hamas did not announce their deaths as it had done following previous eliminations, in order to prevent loss of morale and functioning of its terror operatives.”

The statement did not explain why Israel had waited to announce the claim. It accused the three men of having conducted terrorism against Israel, and said “The IDF and ISA will continue to pursue all of the terrorists responsible for the 7 October massacre.”

Zeina Khodr is in Beirut for Al Jazeera, and reports that civilians in Lebanon’s capital are concerned that the scope of Israeli airstrikes appears to be widening, while Hezbollah has been striking a definat tone.

Speaking from the site of an Israeli strike on a Hezbollah-affiliated medical centre in Beirut, she told viewers:

The civilians who live in this neighbourhood are scared. What they’ve been telling us is that there’s nowhere safe any longer. ‘Where are we supposed to go now?’

These attacks have been – I wouldn’t call them precise, because people are getting hurt, and there’s a lot of destruction – but they are targeted in the sense that the Israeli military is going after everyone or everything associated with Hezbollah. [But] people are expressing a lot of concern that this air campaign is widening

She also suggested that Hezbollah’s ability to push back Israeli troops who were staging an incursion into Lebanon had led to a change of tone from Hezbollah, which had suffered a setback with the assassination of leader Hassan Nasrallah by Israel. Khodr said:

What they tried to do, the Israelis in the past two days, was try to gain yet more political leverage against Hezbollah by launching that ground operation.

But the very fact that Hezbollah pushed them back really worked to Hezbollah’s advantage, because we heard Hezbollah officials last night strike a very different tone, a very defiant tone, saying that, you know, we are ready for what could be an open-ended battle, and we are not going to surrender. We are not going to accept defeat. And we will win, like we did in 2006.

Lebanese minister: 1.2 million people now displaced by Israeli attacks

The Lebanese caretaker environment minister Nasser Yassin has said the number of people displaced in Lebanon has exceeded 1.2 million.

In quotes carried by Lebanon’s National News Agency he said:

We are racing against time to house them, and there are now more than 870 shelters, especially in Beirut and Mount Lebanon, where schools have reached their maximum capacity.

On the prospect of a pause in the conflict, he said:

[There are] some ideas that could constitute an entry point to support the diplomatic track regarding Lebanon’s request for a ceasefire, and to stop the machine of destruction and killing to which it is being subjected.

There are Arab initiatives, including those presented by Egypt, Qatar, and other countries, and France always calls for a ceasefire, but it is clear that the Israeli side does not care about international laws and resolution.

We are activating Lebanese diplomatic work at home and abroad to raise awareness of what is happening in Lebanon and focus on how to protect the country and the Lebanese [people].

In a message on its official Telegram channel, Israel’s military has claimed that it has struck “approximately 200 Hezbollah terrorist targets in Lebanese territory, including terrorist infrastructure sites, terrorists, weapons storage facilities, observation posts.”

Israel also claims to have killed “approximately 15 Hezbollah terrorists” in a strike on the Bint Jbeil municipality building in which it claims Hezbollah was operating.

The claims have not been independently verified.

Lebanese ambassador to UK repeats claim Hezbollah had agreed to ceasefire before Nasrallah assassination by Israel

Patrick Wintour is the Guardian’s diplomatic editor and has this analysis

The Lebanese ambassador to London, Rami Mortada, claimed on Thursday that Hezbollah’s leadership had agreed to a proposed 21 day ceasefire shortly before “hotheads” of Israel blew up the diplomatic path to peace. His comments support a previous assertion made by the Lebanese foreign minister Abdallah Bou Habib.

Mortada, speaking to the BBC, said Hezbollah had come to the table, explaining that after 15 countries, including the US, UK, EU and countries in the Middle East, had issued a ceasefire call “Hezbollah … subscribed to this joint statement, calling for a 21 day ceasefire and immediately starting to look for a diplomatic solution in the framework of the Security Council UN resolution.

“But [Benjamin] Netanyahu,” he continued, “the moment he arrived in New York, he bashed everything [and] made this phenomenal patronising bullying speech at the UN. We were on track trying to discuss a diplomatic alternative to the current abyss, but the hotheads in Israel chose a different path”.

It was known that Israel assassinated Nasrallah shortly after the joint statement calling for a ceasefire, but the claim that Hezbollah’s leadership had come to the negotiating table and actually backed the ceasefire has not been made as clearly before. No statement was issued by Hezbollah at the time, and the focus rapidly shifted to the divisions inside Israel about the ceasefire.

The Lebanese foreign minister, speaking to CNN, said Hezbollah’s leader Hassan Nasrallah had agreed to a ceasefire shortly before his assassination, saying the Speaker of the Lebanese parliament, Nabih Berry, had consulted with Hezbollah, secured its agreement, and the news was then conveyed to the US and the French.

Both the US and the French, he said, told the Lebanese that Netanyahu had agreed with the ceasefire statement which had been issued by the French president, Emmanuel Macron, and US president, Joe Biden.

The US briefed it had issued the statement at the UN about the ceasefire after receiving assurances it was supported by Israel. Netanyahu, faced by a domestic outcry from members of his coalition government, not only backtracked but ordered the assassination of Nasrallah. Far-right interior security minister Itamer Ben-Gvir had threatened to collapse Netanyahu’s coalition if a truce with Hezbollah was agreed.

It is possible the Lebanese are seeking to firm up perception Nasrallah had agreed to de-escalate in order to sharpen the portrait that Netanyahu is the aggressor in this latest spiral of violence.

Emir of Qatar accuses Israel of carrying out a 'collective genocide' in the region

The Emir of Qatar has sharply criticised Israel, saying that it is carrying out a “collective genocide” on neighbouring countries.

Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani said he called for serious ceasefire efforts to stop what he described as Israel’s “agression” againt Lebanon, and said that no peace is possible in the region unless there is the formation of a Palestinian state.

Several prominent members of Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition have openly said they are against a two-state solution, with finance minister Bezalel Smotrich having said it is his “life’s mission” to thwart the creation of a Palestinian state, and that he is actively working to ensure the occupied West Bank is permanently annexed to Israel.

The emir said he had already warned that Israel has acted with inpunity, and said it was clear that what was happening in the region was a “collective genocide” with an aim of rendering Gaza an uninhabitable place.

Hamas-led authorities in the Gaza Strip have put the death toll from Israel’s military campaign at over 40,000, with over 90,000 injured. The government in Lebanon say that about 1,000 have been killed and 6,000 wounded by Israeli strikes in the last couple of weeks. In recent months Israel has also carried out strikes on targets in Iran, Syria and Yemen. Israel has been targeted by missiles from Iran, repeated rocket fire from Iran-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon, and from Yemen’s Houthis. Israel began its military campaign in Gaza after the 7 October surprise attack by Hamas inside southern Israel.

Qatar has, since 7 October 2023, acted as a broker alongside Egypt and the US in trying to organise a ceasefire and hostage exchange between Hamas and Israel. A limited ceasefire and the release of some hostages was achieved towards the end of last year, but negotiations over the last ten months have proved fruitless.

Israel’s military, on its official Telegram channel, has said that during the last hour it intercepted two UAVs and “approximately 25 projectiles were identified crossing from Lebanon.”

The IDF said “Some of the projectiles were intercepted and fallen projectiles were identified”. There were no reports of any casualties.

The claims have not been independently verified.

Reuters notes that state media in Iran reports that flights have resumed in the country. The civil aviation organisation imposed restrictions on Tuesday when Tehran launched missiles at Israel.

Lebanon’s ambassador to the UK, appearing on BBC radio, has said that Israel is “pushing the region towards abyss”.

PA Media reports Rami Mortada said:

On 7 October, there was a genocide that started in Gaza. Conflicts in the region are contagious because the social fabric shared by all the countries of the region. We need to stop this carnage in Gaza, stop this carnage in Lebanon and seek a diplomatic solution.

This expansion of the war theatre does not help. It’s pushing the region towards abyss. It’s time to reverse the trend and look for a diplomatic solution. That’s what we are saying.

Some satellite imagery released via AP shows damage to buildings at Israel’s Nevatim airbase, which was one of the targets of Iran’s missile attack earlier this week.

Emanuel Fabian, military correspondent at the Times of Israel posted the picture to social media, adding “The Israeli military on Wednesday acknowledged that some of its airbases were hit in Iran’s attack, but the damage was deemed “ineffective,” meaning that no harm was caused to the continuous operations of the Israeli Air Force. The missile impacts damaged office buildings and maintenance areas in the bases, according to the military.”

We’ve highlighted some of the blast craters left by the strike. At least four locations in the base are showing signs of damage.

Updated

The IDF has reported that warning sirens are sounding in areas of northern Israel.

More than 70 killed in Israeli attacks in Gaza on Wednesday, Palestinian officials say

More than 70 people were killed by Israeli attacks in Gaza on Wednesday, Palestinian media and officials said, including in Israeli strikes on a school and an orphanage sheltering displaced people.

The health ministry in Gaza said at least 51 people were killed and 82 wounded in an Israeli attack in Khan Younis that began early on Wednesday. Records at the European hospital show that seven women and 12 children, as young as 22 months old, were among those killed.

Citing figures from the Palestinian Red Crescent Society, Palestinian news agency Wafa reported that in addition to the massacre in Khan Younis, where at least 12 children were killed, another ten people were killed in Israeli airstrikes on the Nuseirat and al-Bureij refugee camps in the central Strip.

In Gaza City, nine civilians were killed in Israeli strikes on Muscat school and the al-Amal orphanage, which were housing displaced people. At least 20 people were injured in the attacks, Wafa reported.

Another three people were killed in a raid on the town of Khuza’a, east of Khan Younis, Wafa said.

A child was killed and two other civilians injured when Israeli forces shelled a house belonging to the al-Helou family in the Tel Al-Hawa neighbourhood, south-west of Gaza City, on Wednesday evening, Wafa reported.

It is not possible to independently verify death tolls in Gaza as Israel has barred foreign media from entering.

Hezbollah leader had agreed to ceasefire days before assassination, Lebanese minister claims

Lebanon’s foreign minister claims that Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah had agreed to a 21-day ceasefire pushed by the US and France just days before he was killed by Israel in a massive attack on Beirut.

“He [Nasrallah] agreed, he agreed,” Abdallah Bou Habib told Christiane Amanpour in an interview on CNN broadcast on Wednesday. He continued:

We agreed completely. Lebanon agreed to a ceasefire but consulting with Hezbollah. The [Lebanese House] Speaker Mr Nabih Berri consulted with Hezbollah and we informed the Americans and the French what happened. And they told us that Mr. [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu also agreed on the statement that was issued by both presidents [Biden and Macron.]

Habib said White House senior adviser Amos Hochstein was then set to go to Lebanon to negotiate the ceasefire.

They told us that Mr Netanyahu agreed on this and so we also got the agreement of Hezbollah on that and you know what happened since then.

Iran’s president, Masoud Pezeshkian, was reported to have said on Sunday that Iran had refrained from retaliating for the Israeli assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran because of “entirely false” US and European promises that a Gaza ceasefire was imminent.

“Giving such criminals more time will only embolden them to commit even more atrocities,” he told a cabinet meeting according to Turkey’s Anadolu news agency.

Yemen’s Houthis have said they targeted Tel Aviv with drones.

The Israeli military said it had intercepted a “suspicious aerial target” off the coast of Tel Aviv overnight.

Israel launched a wave of deadly airstrikes against what it said were Houthi targets in Yemen on Sunday.

The attack on the port of Hodeidah in Yemen involved dozens of Israeli planes and appeared to have targeted fuel facilities, power plants and docks at the Ras Issa and Hodeidah ports.

Analysis: Gulf leaders support Palestine – but many would not mind seeing Israel challenge Iran

Gulf state leaders, despite popular support in their countries for the Palestinian cause, are unlikely to change their own collective year-long strategy of not providing Palestinians anything other than humanitarian aid and political support.

Events can change at speed, but at present they face the prospect of a resurgent Israel determined to break out of the stalemate in Gaza by destroying Hezbollah’s military leadership and rendering Iran so weak that it can never fire at Israel again.

Reports that Israel is considering hitting Iran’s oil installations, let alone its nuclear sites, will unnerve the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). One Arab diplomat, no friend of Iran, said he feared for the moral implications of an Israeli “total victory”. It would bequeath the Middle East with a grim lesson – that “justice” can be obtained through total war.

The argument of the GCC, chaired by Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani, Qatar’s prime minister, remains that a ceasefire between Hamas and Israel is the solution to the crisis. But Israel’s killing of Qatar’s key interlocutor, the Hamas political bureau member Ismail Haniyeh, was a severe blow to Doha’s hopes of achieving this.

Equally, on the second front – Lebanon – the GCC states, including Kuwait, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, have already urged Israel to respect the country’s sovereignty and accept a ceasefire. But at the same time none have endorsed Iran’s attack on Israel.

If Israel’s resurgence continues, the Gulf and Arab states may face a dilemma. On the one hand, the long-term weakening of Iranian influence might create an unwelcome and destabilising vacuum, one in which only Israel’s Iron Wall holds sway in the region. On the other hand, it might represent an opportunity for regional states to exploit Iran’s weakness and push back Iranian-backed non-state actors.

Here are some pictures from Beirut’s Bachoura neighbourhood, where at least six people were killed in an Israeli airstrike on a medical centre.

Six killed in Israeli strike on central Beirut medical centre, Lebanon says

Israeli strikes on a central Beirut medical centre have killed at least six people, after Israel’s military suffered its deadliest day on the Lebanese front in a year of clashes with Iran-backed Hezbollah.

Residents in Beirut heard a missile flying above the city before hearing the sound of the explosion. Videos showed the floor of an apartment building burning. Residents living in nearby areas began to flee, driving away quickly in scooters and cars.

The Israeli strike hit a medical centre belonging to the Hezbollah-linked Islamic Health Organisation in the early hours of Thursday. The attack was the second airstrike on central Beirut this week, with most strikes having previously been confined to suburbs in the city’s south.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said it was targeting Beirut and issued evacuation warnings for various locations throughout the night. Three missiles also hit the southern suburb of Dahiyeh, where Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah was killed last week, and loud explosions were heard, Lebanese security officials said.

At least six people were killed and seven wounded, Lebanese health officials said, adding that a further 46 people had been killed in Israeli attacks on the city in the previous 24 hours.

A day after Iran fired more than 180 missiles into Israel, the wider region awaited Israel response to the attack, with US president Joe Biden saying he would not support an Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear sites, as he attempted to contain a rapidly escalating regional conflict.

Updated

Opening summary

Hello and welcome to the Guardian’s live coverage of the conflict in the Middle East.

Israel carried out hours of airstrikes on Beirut early on Thursday and the Lebanese health ministry says at least six people have been killed and seven injured in an Israeli attack on a health centre in the central suburb of Bachoura.

The medical centre belonged to the Hezbollah-linked Islamic Health Organisation. It is the second time central Beirut has been targeted since Israel began its bombing campaign a couple of weeks ago. The area is home to the Lebanese parliament and the UN’s regional headquarters. It is a war crime to target health workers.

The southern district of Dahiyeh, which is where Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah was killed last week, has also been repeatedly targeted. The IDF had issued warnings to people in several neighbourhoods but it is not clear whether they were issued in time for people to flee.

The attacks come as Hezbollah and Israel clashed in southern Lebanon, with Israel confirming the deaths of eight soldiers as it continued its ground invasion.

Iran was meanwhile bracing itself for potential Israeli attacks on its nuclear facilities following its own unprecedented missile barrage on Israel, which in turn came after Israel’s deadly attack on Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah last week.

US President Joe Biden has said that Washington would not support such an attack on Iran, but Israel has repeatedly flouted US demands not to escalate its conflicts.

In other developments:

  • Lebanon’s health ministry said prior to the strike on central Lebanon that 46 people had been killed and 85 wounded in Israeli strikes on Lebanon in the past 24 hours. Israeli strikes have killed more than 1,000 people in Lebanon over the past two weeks, many of them women and children, according to the ministry.

  • Israel will respond to Iran’s missile attack and its forces can strike anywhere in the Middle East, its military chief said. “We have the capability to reach and strike every location in the Middle East and those of our enemies who have not yet understood this, will understand this soon,” Herzi Halevi, chief of the general staff, said in a video on Wednesday. “Iran made a big mistake tonight – and it will pay for it.” Israel’s foreign minister Israel Katz threatened Israeli retaliation for Iran’s “brutal” missile attack.

  • Iran braced itself for likely Israeli attacks on its nuclear sites as the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, urged the west to leave the Middle East. The unprecedented Iranian salvo of more than 180 ballistic missiles came less than 24 hours after the Benjamin Netanyahu ordered the largest ground incursion into southern Lebanon in a generation.

  • Iran’s ambassador to the UN, Amir Saied Iravani, said Tuesday’s missile attacks against Israel were “necessary to restore balance and deterrence”, adding that they were a “proportionate response to Israel’s continued terrorist aggressive acts over the past two months”. “Experience has proven that Israel only understands the language of force,” he told the council as he defend Tehran’s actions in line with the UN Charter.

  • Abbas Araghchi, Iran’s foreign minister, earlier made a round of diplomatic calls, insisting that Iran was not seeking escalation. Part of the purpose of Araghchi’s calls was to convey the limits of the Iranian operation, and to urge the US and Europe to insist in turn that Israel show restraint in its response.

  • Joe Biden, the US president, said he would not support an Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear sites, as the US sought to temper Israel’s response to Iran’s missile attack on Tuesday and contain a rapidly escalating regional conflict. Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, convened a meeting of his top security officials at the Israeli defence headquarters, the Kirya in Tel Aviv, on Wednesday afternoon to discuss the country’s options after a round of conversations with Washington.

  • Biden and G7 leaders “unequivocally” condemned the Iranian missile attack on Israel during a call on Wednesday, the White House said. In a readout of the call, the White House said Biden joined the call with the G7 to discuss the Iranian attack and “to coordinate on a response to this attack, including new sanctions”.

  • More than 70 people have been killed in a series of Israeli attacks in southern Gaza, Palestinian medical officials said on Wednesday, including at least a dozen children. The health ministry in Gaza said at least 51 people were killed and 82 wounded in the operation in Khan Younis that began early on Wednesday. Records at the European hospital show that seven women and 12 children, as young as 22 months old, were among those killed. Another 23 people, including two children, were killed in separate strikes across Gaza, according to local hospitals.

  • At least 41,689 Palestinians have been killed and 96,625 others injured in Israeli military strikes across the Gaza Strip since 7 October, Gaza’s health ministry said on Wednesday. Israel has continued to strike what it says are militant targets across Gaza nearly a year after Hamas’s 7 October attack triggered the war in the territory, and even as attention has shifted to Lebanon and Iran.

  • The son-in-law of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah was reportedly killed in an Israeli airstrike. The UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that Hassan Jaafar Qasir was among three people killed by the attack, which flattened a building in the Mazzeh district, an area favoured by Hezbollah militants and officers of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

  • Hamas’s armed wing, the al-Qassam brigades, claimed responsibility for a shooting and knife attack in Tel Aviv on Tuesday that killed at least seven people. Across the country, there was a sense of apprehension on Wednesday as Israel vowed to retaliate against Iran for the missile strike.

  • Eight Israeli soldiers have been killed and a number of others wounded in three exchanges with Hezbollah in heavy fighting inside Lebanon, according to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). The deaths appeared to signify the first substantial clashes between IDF soldiers and Hezbollah since Israel said it had initiated a limited ground incursion into Lebanon to target Hezbollah’s infrastructure along the border.

  • Hezbollah said it inflicted casualties on a group of Israeli soldiers attempting to assault the Lebanese village of Odaisseh, not far from the border. The Iran-backed group also said its fighters wounded and killed a group of Israeli soldiers in southern Lebanon after detonating an explosive device. It also claimed it had destroyed three Israeli Merkava tanks with guided rockets in the Lebanese border town of Maroun el-Ras.

  • The IDF claimed to have destroyed “over 150 terror infrastructures”, which it said included “Hezbollah headquarters, weapons storage facilities and rocket launchers” inside Lebanon. Israel’s military also reported a continued barrage of projectiles fired into the country from Lebanon.

  • António Guterres, the UN secretary-general, on Wednesday condemned Iran’s missile attack on Israel, telling the security council the “deadly cycle of tit-for-tat violence must stop”. “Time is running out,” he told the council. Earlier on Wednesday, Israel’s foreign minister Israel Katz said he was barring Guterres from entering the country because he had not “unequivocally” condemned Iran’s missile attack on Israel. The UN has decried the Israeli government’s decision to ban Guterres from entering the country as a “political statement” and “one more attack on the United Nations staff that we’ve seen from the government of Israel”.

  • A charter flight to evacuate Britons from Lebanon landed in Birmingham late on Wednesday. The Dan Air plane landed at Birmingham international airport just before 8.40pm, having stopped off in Bucharest en route. Beirut’s international airport remains open but ministers and officials are preparing contingency plans for sea and air rescues via Cyprus should the security situation in Lebanon deteriorate to the point at which commercial flights are stopped.

  • Thousands of foreign nationals have left Lebanon since Israel stepped up its campaign against Hezbollah just over a fortnight ago. Slovakia is preparing to evacuate its nationals from Lebanon, and has received permission from the Lebanese government to use a military plane for the purpose. China’s state-owned news agency Xinhua reported that over 200 Chinese nationals have been evacuated from Lebanon. The US state department said it organised a flight from Beirut to Istanbul on Wednesday to allow Americans to leave Lebanon. French nationals in Iran have been recommended to leave temporarily once international air traffic resumes. Germany’s foreign ministry also urged its citizens to leave Iran.

  • Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, warned Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah to flee Lebanon days before he was killed in an Israeli strike last week, according to a report. In the immediate aftermath of the attack that targeted pagers used by Hezbollah members on 17 September, Khamenei sent a message with an envoy to beseech Nasrallah to leave Lebanon for Iran, a senior Iranian official told Reuters.

Updated

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