New Delhi: At least 182 people, including women, children and medics, were killed in Israeli strikes on southern Lebanon on Monday, the country’s health ministry said in a statement.
Those wounded and injured numbered 727 as Israel attacked hundreds of Hezbollah targets.
It was the deadliest day in Lebanon since the violent armed conflict between Isael and Hamas-led Palestine military groups started in the region last October.
Iran’s Foreign Ministry warned Israel of ‘dangerous consequences’.
“We strongly condemn the silence and support of the US and some Western states to the Zionist regime and warn against the continuation of the regime’s crimes against Palestinians and its attempt to expand war to the entire region. There will be dangerous consequences to the new adventure of the Zionists,” Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanaani Kanaani said in the ministry’s Telegram channel.
After almost a year of war against Hamas in Gaza on its southern border, Israel is shifting focus to its northern border.
Ahead of the latest airstrikes, Israel warned civilians to evacuate those areas where it said the armed group was storing weapons.
According to Israeli army spokesperson Avichay Adraee, more than 300 Hezbollah targets had been struck so far.
In response, Iran-backed Hezbollah fired rockets at Israeli military posts, in support of its ally Hamas.
Hamas condemned Monday’s Israeli strikes on south Lebanon.
“We, in the Islamic Resistance Movement Hamas, affirm that this widescale barbaric aggression is a war crime,” Hamas said in a statement, adding that the group reaffirmed its “solidarity with our brothers in Hezbollah and the brotherly Lebanese people.”
