Israeli army detects rocket barrage, drone launched from Lebanon

By Abdelraouf Arnaout

JERUSALEM (AA) - The Israeli military detected a rocket barrage and a drone launched from Lebanon toward northern Israel, the army said in a statement Thursday.

“Following the alerts activated in the Golan Heights, a suspicious aerial target (drone) that penetrated from Lebanon was intercepted, with no injuries reported,” the Israeli military said.

It further detected at least five mortar shells near the settlement of Shamir, with no injuries reported, according to the statement.

Around 20 rockets were also detected being launched from Lebanon toward occupied Upper Galilee, and “most of them were intercepted, while the remainder fell in open areas, with no injuries reported,” added the army.

The Lebanese group Hezbollah announced that it had targeted the new settlement of Shamir in northern Israel “for the first time with Katyusha rockets.”

It continued that the attack was “in response to the Israeli enemy's assaults on the steadfast southern villages and safe homes, particularly in the city of Marjaayoun, and the injuries to civilians there.”

Fears have grown about a full-blown war between Israel and Hezbollah amid a months-long exchange of cross-border fire, especially with Hezbollah threatening military retaliation after the assassination of its top commander Fouad Shukr in an Israeli airstrike on a Beirut suburb on July 30.

The escalation comes against the backdrop of an Israeli onslaught on the Gaza Strip which has killed nearly 40,000 people since last October following a cross-border attack by the Palestinian resistance group Hamas.

*Writing by Rania Abu Shamala in Istanbul