Israeli airstrike kills 3 in southern Beirut suburb: Lebanese Health Ministry

By Wassim Seif El Din

BEIRUT (AA) — An Israeli airstrike killed at least three people in Beirut's Southern Suburb region, injuring others, according to Lebanon's Health Ministry.

"Three killed and 17 injured in an Israeli airstrike on the Southern Suburb of Beirut," the Health Ministry said in an initial tally following the attack on the country's capital.

The official Lebanese National News Agency (NNA) said the Israeli airstrike hit an apartment in one of the residential buildings of the Jamous area, adding that the attack left "five children" killed.

Ambulances and civil defense teams rushed to the area and transferred several of injured to the hospital.

Following the airstrike, a senior Israeli official told Israeli Army Radio that the target was Ibrahim Aqil, a top military commander of Lebanese group Hezbollah.

The broadcaster did not clarify whether the assassination attempt was a success.

Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati said the raid "proves again that the Israeli enemy does not value any human, legal or moral considerations, and is going on in what looks like a genocide."

According to an Anadolu correspondent on the ground, the Israeli strike severely damaged buildings in southern Beirut.

Hezbollah is yet to comment on the airstrike, which came amid an escalation in cross-border warfare with Israel since the start of Tel Aviv's deadly war on the Gaza Strip, where nearly 41,300 people, mostly women and children, were killed following a cross-border attack by the Palestinian group Hamas on Oct. 7 last year.

*Writing by Ahmed Asmar