(Bloomberg) -- Israel’s warplanes bombed Beirut overnight, after eight of its soldiers were killed in southern Lebanon in ongoing ground battles against Hezbollah.
Nine people died in the center of the Lebanese capital after an Israeli strike on a medical site affiliated with Hezbollah, according to local authorities including the health ministry. The Israel Defense Forces said Thursday it killed 15 Hezbollah militants in an overnight airstrike on a local government building used by the group in the town of Bint Jbeil.
A drone attack also took place on a weapons-storage facility in Syria near Russia’s biggest airbase there, the Syrian Human Rights Observatory reported. No one has claimed responsibility for that strike.
The Israeli government is yet to retaliate for Iran’s barrage of missiles on Tuesday evening, which caused little damage and few casualties. World powers are concerned that, should it strike key Iranian assets, the Islamic Republic will lash out and escalate the conflict, dragging in more countries and potentially disrupting global energy shipments.
US President Joe Biden said Israel should hold off from targeting Iran’s nuclear facilities, something Tehran has long warned would provoke an aggressive response.
“The answer is no,” he said to a question about whether the US would support such an attack by Israel. “They have a right to respond, but they have to respond proportionally.”
Israel has carried out a series of devastating attacks in Lebanon since last month that almost wiped out the leadership of Hezbollah, Iran’s main proxy militia, considered a terrorist organization by the US and other countries. Iran said its salvo against Israel was because of those assaults and the assassination of a senior Hamas official in Tehran in July, which the Islamic Republic blamed on Israel.
Israel sent troops into southern Lebanon on Monday in a bid to uproot Hezbollah militants along the border. Hundreds of Lebanese civilians have died in Israeli air strikes in the past two weeks and a million people have fled their homes in the south and some other parts of the country, Lebanon’s government says.
The European Union announced it’s increasing humanitarian aid for Lebanon by 30 million euros ($33 million) to more than 100 million euros a year.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is pushing ahead with the campaign against Hezbollah despite calls by the Biden administration and allies including France and Saudi Arabia for a cease-fire. Netanyahu said his government has no choice because diplomatic efforts to stop Hezbollah drone and missile strikes on Israel have failed.
Netanyahu has widespread support domestically for the ground and air offensive in Lebanon, which is also an effort to ensure tens of thousands of displaced Israelis can return to their homes in the north.
The prime minister is under pressure from Israelis to respond far more forcefully to Iran’s salvo than he did in April. Israel hit an Iranian military facility in a limited strike that month, after Tehran fired 300 missiles and drones that were largely intercepted and did little damage.
Israel’s options include targeting the OPEC member’s oil infrastructure or military bases. Potentially the most extreme scenario would be an attack on its nuclear facilities, something called for by former Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, among others.
“The next issue is how Israel responds,” said Wendy Sherman, who served as the US State Department’s No. 2 official until 2023. “If you’re precise in your response, you can do exactly what you want to do and no more. But if something goes awry, you can escalate past the point that you wanted to escalate.”
In an effort to reduce the tensions, Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian met in Qatar, the state-run Saudi Press Agency reported. Pezeshkian also met Qatar’s ruler, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani.
Qatar said it would keep trying to stabilize the region.
--With assistance from Kateryna Kadabashy, Akayla Gardner, Omar Tamo and Dana Khraiche.
(Updates with death toll in Beirut in second paragraph, with details of Israeli operation in southern Lebanon)
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