Israeli carried out a limited airstrike in southern Lebanon today Monday morning, reportedly killing two people, after a drone struck a vehicle and a motorbike in the village of Meiss El- Jabal.
Meanwhile, the Israeli army said that the air defence system intercepted a drone crossing from Lebanon into the Western Galilee in the early morning hours.
The Middle East has been bracing for a major retaliation after a Hezbollah rocket killed 12 children in the Israeli occupied Golan Heights on Saturday.
Israel’s security cabinet on Sunday night gave Benjamin Netanyahu and authority to decide on the timing and size of a response.
“Hezbollah will not wash itself clean from this incident, even with its ridiculous denials. It fired, and it will pay a heavy price for its actions,” Yoav Gallant, the defence minister said.
Israel and the United States blamed Lebanon’s Hezbollah for Saturday’s strike. The Iran-backed group has denied any role.
The incident in which a missile hit a sports field in the Golan Heights, has risked tipping the fragile standoff into a more serious escalation, drawing international calls on both sides to show restraint.
There was no immediate indication of what action Israel may take but the country’s largest newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth quoted unnamed officials as saying the response would be “limited but significant”.
The report said options for retaliation ranged from a limited but “photogenic” attack on infrastructure including bridges, power plants and ports, to hitting Hezbollah weapons depots or targeting high-level Hezbollah commanders.
Monday’s Israeli drone strike in southern Lebanon wounded three people including an infant, an official in the Lebanese civil defence told Reuters. The rescue service did not say whether the dead were fighters or civilians.
It marks the single deadliest attack in Israel or Israeli annexed territory since Hamas’ assault sparked the Gaza War on Oct 7. And it is fueling fears of significant escalation between Israel and Hezbollah militants in Lebanon.
The Israeli military said its air defences downed a drone which crossed from Lebanon into the area of Western Galilee on Monday.
Flights at Beirut’s international airport have been cancelled or delayed as airlines responded to the possibility of an Israeli response.
Both Israel and Hezbollah have appeared at pains to avoid a full-scale war since they began trading blows in October in a conflict ignited by the Gaza war.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Sunday he does not want to see an escalation of conflict on Israel’s northern border and reiterated US support for Israel.
“I emphasize (Israel’s) right to defend its citizens and our determination to make sure that they’re able to do that,” Blinken said during a news conference in Tokyo. “But we also don’t want to see the conflict escalate. We don’t want to see it spread.”
Hezbollah has denied firing the rocket that killed the youngsters but it said at the time it had fired a missile against a military target on the Golan Heights, a border area Israel seized from Syria after the 1967 Middle East war and has since annexed in a move not generally recognized internationally.
