ISRAEL’s military has advanced beyond the Litani River in southern Lebanon for the first time since 2006 and appear poised to encircle the major city of Nabatieh.
Senior Lebanese military sources on Saturday told the Turkish state news agency Anadolu that Israeli forces had crossed the Litani River, which Israel has declared the perimeter of its unofficial buffer zone.
Israeli forces are now on the outskirts of Nabatieh, a city that is key to southern Lebanon’s economy and a cultural hub for the region. If the Shia-majority city were to fall, it would mark a significant development in Israel’s war on Lebanon and subsequent official ceasefire.
Nabatieh is viewed by many Lebanese as a symbol of resistance due to its historic role on the front line of Israeli assaults.
Reporting from the southern city of Tyre, Al Jazeera’s Obaida Hitto said Israel was expanding its air campaign in southern Lebanon and encircling Nabatieh in preparation for a potential assault on the city.
“It looks like Israel is trying to make this final push to encircle Nabatieh, breaking through the second and third lines of defence of Hezbollah and isolating the western Bekaa Valley from the south of the country,” Hitto said.
In a statement, Lebanon’s military said that “two soldiers were seriously wounded as a result of being targeted inside a vehicle by a hostile Israeli drone” near Nabatieh.
Late on Saturday, Lebanon’s National News Agency (NNA) reported that at least one paramedic was killed and four others injured in an Israeli drone attack on the southern Lebanese village of Jebchit. The attack also damaged the Lebanese Relief Hospital but all medical, nursing and ambulance staff are safe, NNA added.
Separately, Israeli air strikes and artillery shelling hit near Beaufort castle, which is located about 15km (nine miles) from the Israeli border and overlooks large parts of southern Lebanon, NNA said. The 12th century castle was held by Israeli forces for 18 years until they withdrew from Lebanon in May 2000.
In retaliation on Saturday, Hezbollah said it fired rockets at the northern Israeli town of Kiryat Shmona.
The group also ambushed Israeli soldiers near Ghandouriyeh in southern Lebanon, saying it forced them to withdraw.
In separate statements later in the day, Hezbollah said it destroyed an Israeli military vehicle near the Lebanese village of Yohmor al-Shaqif after it was targeted by Ababil attack drones and launched a drone attack on the Yaara barracks in northern Israel.
Further attacks included a drone strike on an Israeli army command headquarters in the southern Lebanese village of Naqoura and a missile barrage targeting Israeli military infrastructure in the city of Nahariyya in northern Israel.