Israeli warplanes destroy TV channel HQ in Beirut suburb

By Wassim Seif El Din

BEIRUT (AA) - Israeli warplanes attacked a TV channel headquarters in Beirut late Monday, marking the first targeting of a Lebanese media institution amid a massive offensive on Lebanon.

According to an Anadolu reporter, an Israeli airstrike hit the headquarters of pro-Hezbollah Al-Sirat TV channel in Beirut's southern suburb, leveling the building.

Shortly before the attack, the Israeli army ordered staffers to leave, claiming that the site was being used for producing “combat means.”

No injuries were reported in the attack.

Hezbollah, for its part, denied storing weapons inside civilian buildings hit by Israeli warplanes, including Al-Sirat TV channel headquarters.

Since Sept. 23, Israel has launched massive airstrikes against what it calls Hezbollah targets across Lebanon, killing more than 1,057 people and injuring over 2,950 others, according to the Lebanese Health Ministry.

Several Hezbollah leaders have been killed in the assault, including its leader Hassan Nasrallah.

Hezbollah and Israel have been engaged in cross-border warfare since the start of Israel's war on Gaza, which has killed nearly 41,600 people, most of them women and children, following a cross-border attack by the Palestinian group Hamas last October.

The international community has warned that Israeli attacks in Lebanon could escalate the Gaza conflict into a wider regional war.

*Writing by Ahmed Asmar in Ankara