UPDATE - At least 15 killed, 33 injured in Israeli attacks against northern, central Lebanon

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By Wassim Seifeddine

BEIRUT (AA) - At least 15 people were killed in Israeli airstrikes Saturday against northern and central Lebanon, according to the Lebanese Health Ministry.

The first strike targeted an apartment in a residential building in the town of Barja in Mount Lebanon in the central area of the country, killing four people and injuring 14 others, it said.

The airstrike marked the first attack on the town since the onset of the onslaught, according to local media.​​​​​​​

The second strike hit a home in the town of Maaysrah in Mount Lebanon, killing nine and injuring 15, said the ministry.

It reported separately that two people were killed and four injured in an Israeli airstrike on the town of Deir Billah in northern Lebanon.

Israel has mounted massive airstrikes across Lebanon against, what it claims are Hezbollah targets since Sept. 23, killing at least 1,411 people, injuring over 3,970 and displacing more than 1.34 million.

The aerial campaign is an escalation from a year of cross-border warfare between Israel and Hezbollah since the start of its offensive on the Gaza Strip, in which Israel has killed nearly 42,200 people, most of them women and children, since a Hamas attack last year.

Despite international warnings that the Mideast was on the brink of a regional war amid Israel’s relentless attacks on Gaza and Lebanon, it expanded the conflict by launching an incursion into southern Lebanon on Oct. 1.

*Writing by Rania Abu Shamala