Conflict escalates in Middle East

Israel struck a Hezbollah target in Syria on Thursday, a war monitor said, and the US used heavy bombers to hit rebel targets in Yemen nearly a month into the war in Lebanon.

Syria, the Houthi rebels in Yemen, Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza belong to the axis of resistance led by Iran, which on October 1 conducted a missile strike on Israel.

Israel has vowed to retaliate for Iran’s strike, sparking concern across the world that the war on multiple fronts could morph into an all-out regional conflict.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards chief on Thursday warned that Tehran would hit Israel “painfully” if it attacked Iranian targets.

“If you make a mistake and attack our targets, whether in the region or in Iran, we will strike you again painfully,” Hossein Salami said.

Salami was speaking at the funeral of a Guards general who was killed in an Israeli strike on south Beirut last month. The strike also killed Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah.

Syrian state media say an Israeli strike on the city of Latakia, a stronghold of President Bashar al-Assad, wounded two civilians.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based monitor, said the Israeli raid targeted a “weapons depot belonging to Hezbollah”.

The Israeli military did not comment.

Israel has conducted hundreds of strikes in Syria in recent years, including multiple attacks along the Lebanese border that seek to cut off Hezbollah’s main weapons and equipment supply route from Iran to Lebanon.

In Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen, Israel’s main ally, the US, conducted multiple B-2 bomber strikes on weapon storage facilities, the US military and defence department said.

The B-2 is a stealth aircraft capable of flying non-stop from the US, with a payload of 18 000kg of bombs, the US Air Force says on its website. That is a far heavier weapons load than on most other modern warplanes.

Mohammed al-Basha, a Yemen and Middle East security analyst in the US, said the use of B-2 bombers indicated Washington was taking “a firmer stance” against the Houthis.

Hamas sparked the Gaza war with Israel with its attack on October 7 last year, which resulted in the deaths of 1 206 people, mostly civilians, according to Israeli figures. The Israeli campaign in Gaza has killed 42438 people, mostly civilians, according to figures from the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory, which the UN considers reliable. In support of its ally, Hamas, Hezbollah opened up a front against Israel by launching cross-border attacks from Lebanon last year. The ensuing exchanges of fire forced tens of thousands of people on both sides to flee their homes.

With Hamas weakened, Israel focussed on Lebanon, launching strikes on Hezbollah strongholds and, on September 30, sending in ground troops. On Wednesday, Israel’s bombardment of Hezbollah targets toppled buildings and killed a city mayor in southern Lebanon.

Lebanon’s health ministry said 16 people were killed in strikes on two municipal buildings in the southern city of Nabatiyeh.

On Thursday, Israel issued an evacuation warning for civilians in part of the eastern Lebanese Bekaa valley, a Hezbollah stronghold.

Israeli troops and Hezbollah fighters have been clashing near Lebanon’s border with Israel, where Hezbollah said on Thursday that it hit four Israeli tanks with guided missiles. Rescue workers affiliated with Amal in the southern city of Qana were digging through the rubble of several buildings destroyed in a bombing this week.

The war has left at least 1373 people dead, according to Lebanese Health Ministry figures.

Israel has faced criticism over its strikes in Lebanon, including from its tops arms supplier the US.

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Washington had told Israel its operations should “not threaten the lives of civilians”, UN peacekeepers deployed in the country or the Lebanese military.

The Unifil peacekeeping mission has accused Israeli forces of deliberately “firing at their watchtower” . The Israeli military said later that it was not targeting UN peacekeepers.

In Gaza, Israel has faced condemnation over the levels of aid reaching the besieged territory, with the UN agency for Palestinian refugees warning that there was risk of famine.

For more than a week, Israeli forces have staged air and ground assaults in northern Gaza and the Jabalia area, saying that Hamas militants were regrouping there.

The head of the civil defence agency in northern Gaza, Ahmed al-Kahlout, said more than 200 000 people had been “deprived of food aid for the 12th consecutive day, as well as potable water”.

Cape Times