Before dawn in southern Lebanon, a residential building in Kfar Rumman was reduced to rubble — and, according to Lebanon’s health ministry, at least 13 people were killed, among them six children, in what officials described as one of the deadliest days of Israeli bombardment in recent weeks.
The attack has sharpened anxieties across Lebanon that Israel may be moving toward a renewed military campaign, following several days of intensifying strikes despite a June ceasefire intended to stop hostilities between the Israeli military and the Lebanese armed group Hezbollah.
A woman who said she was related to at least three of those killed said one strike hit as children were preparing to head to school.
Israel’s military said it targeted people it said were seen transferring weapons in the area of Kfar Rumman.
At the impact site, schoolbooks lay scattered amid broken concrete where the home had stood. Rescue crews, aided by heavy machinery, worked through the morning to reach victims trapped beneath the debris.
Locals said eight-year-old Mustafa Farhat lost his grandparents and his mother. They added that rescuers were still searching this morning for his father’s body, while Mustafa remained in hospital receiving treatment for his injuries.
Mona Farhat, a relative, said the family’s house was struck in the moments leading up to school-time.
“What did they target? What is the goal they are targeting? Do they want us to leave our land? They are mistaken,” Mr Farhat said at the hospital.
In an updated toll posted on its website, Lebanon’s health ministry said 12 people — including six children and three women — were killed in the strike on the residential building.
Lebanon’s state media had earlier reported the attack occurred after midnight.
The health ministry said a separate Israeli drone strike hit a civilian vehicle in the town, killing one medic. Two other medics were wounded, it said.
The strikes on Kfar Rumman came without an online evacuation warning from the Israeli military.
Israel reviewing reports of civilians hurt
Israel’s military said it had taken measures to reduce harm “to uninvolved individuals, including the use of precise munitions and aerial surveillance”.
It said it was reviewing reports that “uninvolved individuals” had been harmed in the strikes.
Israel’s military also said Hezbollah launched two explosive drones overnight toward Israeli troops operating near the Ali al-Taher ridge — a strategic set of hills in southeastern Lebanon where Hezbollah is thought to have built an underground military complex.
Destruction at the site of an Israeli airstrike that targeted the southern Lebanese town of Deir Zahrani last week
Israel said last week it had cleared Hezbollah fighters from the ridge.
Hezbollah has not commented, and Reuters said it could not independently verify the military situation at Ali al-Taher.
Since then, Israeli strikes have grown deadlier in towns north and west of the ridge, where residents had begun returning after the June ceasefire, Lebanese security officials told Reuters.
The officials said they expect further escalation in the south in the coming weeks.
On Saturday, at least 11 people were killed in Israeli strikes on three towns near the ridge, the health ministry said in an updated toll.
Two of the victims were women killed in attacks on the town of Arab Salim, where Israel’s military issued an online evacuation warning at 6.04am local time (03.04am GMT).
The health ministry said other strikes on Saturday destroyed the Ghandour hospital in the town of Nabatieh al-Fawqa.
It added that four more people — including a woman — were killed on Friday.
Those strikes came without evacuation warnings.
Lebanon’s health ministry says Israeli strikes on Lebanon have killed more than 4,300 people since Hezbollah fired rockets at Israel on 2 March — two days after the start of US and Israeli strikes on Iran — setting off an Israeli air and ground offensive.
According to the ministry, the dead include more than 250 children, nearly 400 women and more than 130 medics.
The ministry does not otherwise differentiate between civilians and militants, and Hezbollah has not released its own death toll for fighters.
While the ceasefire dramatically reduced violence, Israeli troops occupying swathes of southern Lebanon have continued demolishing villages inside what Israel has described as a security zone.
Israel’s military has also continued conducting strikes within that zone and farther north, mostly without issuing evacuation warnings.
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