Israel strikes in Beirut, battles Hezbollah in Southern Lebanon

The strike in Beirut’s Bachoura neighborhood early Thursday killed at least six people, according to the Lebanese health ministry. Witnesses said there were strikes on two different apartments on the same floor of a building shortly after midnight.

The Israeli military said that it had conducted a precision strike in Beirut, without offering further details. It wasn’t immediately clear if the statement was in reference to the same attack.

The Bachoura strike is the second time that Israel has struck within the city limits of the Lebanese capital since it launched an escalation of its campaign against Hezbollah and other militant groups in Lebanon. Most of its other airstrikes have targeted the southern suburbs of Beirut, targeting what Israel says are Hezbollah facilities.

A massive Israeli airstrike in the southern section of Beirut killed Hezbollah’s secretary-general, Hassan Nasrallah, on Friday night, sending residents of the area spilling into other areas of the capital and triggering fears of a widening of the war. Hezbollah’s main backer, Iran, launched a ballistic missile attack on Israel on Tuesday that it said was retaliation in part for the killing of Nasrallah.

The recent Israeli strike just after midnight hit a central area of the capital near the Lebanese parliament and other institutions, raising concerns that Israel could expand its air campaign, a move that would likely further destabilize Lebanon, a tiny country in financial ruin that is struggling to cope with the current war.

Israel says its air and ground offensive on Lebanon is intended to roll back Hezbollah’s presence along the country’s shared border in order to return tens of thousands of residents of northern Israel to their homes after a year in which they have been uprooted by the militant group’s attacks. The war has also displaced more than 340,000 people in Lebanon since last year, according to data from the United Nations’ migration organization.

The Israeli military overnight separately released a notice warning residents of Beirut’s southern suburbs to stay away from certain locations that it said were linked to Hezbollah and that it said it would be targeting soon.

Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency said Israeli forces launched 17 separate attacks on the southern suburbs overnight. The Israeli military didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on the attacks.

Much of the southern suburbs have already seen people leave, with most residents fleeing to safety in other parts of the country.

The airstrikes came after Israel announced the first deaths in its ground offensive in Lebanon, releasing the names of eight soldiers who were killed in combat. Both Israel and Hezbollah said they were engaged in fighting in southern Lebanon after Israeli forces breached the border earlier this week.

The deaths point to the dangers of Israel’s land operation in Lebanon, where it now faces Hezbollah on terrain where the militia group has twice fought the Israeli military to a standstill in recent decades.

More than 1,000 people were killed in less than two weeks after Israel intensified its campaign against Hezbollah in September, according to the Lebanese health ministry.

The Israeli military also on Thursday said it shot down an aerial drone near Tel Aviv after a pair of drones were detected over the Mediterranean near Israel’s largest city. A second drone crashed, the military said.

The Israeli air force also said 25 projectiles were launched from Lebanon toward Israel, with some intercepted, others crashing.

Saleh al-Batati and Adam Chamseddine contributed to this article.