Hezbollah rocket attack kills 7 people in northern Israel

Two separate rocket attacks by Hezbollah have killed seven people in northern Israel, authorities said, marking the deadliest day of such attacks in months.

Foreign Minister Israel Katz announced that a rocket hit near the Lebanese border town of Metula, killing an Israeli farmer and four foreign farm workers.

Later, an Israeli woman and her adult son were murdered in an olive grove near Kibbutz Afek on the outskirts of the coastal city of Haifa.

Hezbollah said it fired a barrage of rockets at Israeli forces in the Kreyyot area north of Haifa and south of the Lebanese town of Qiam across the border in Metullah.

The Israeli military confirmed on Thursday morning that two projectiles had arrived from Lebanon and landed in an open field near Metulla.

The murdered Israeli farmer was named by local media as Omar Weinstein, a 46-year-old father of four living near Kibbutz Dafna.

According to Haaretz News Agency, all four of the killed foreign workers were Thai nationals.

A fifth foreign worker was seriously injured by shrapnel. A video posted online showed them being transported by helicopter to the Ramban Healthcare Campus in Haifa.

Haaretz said Weinstein and the foreign workers were on farmland near the border fence at the time of the attack.

The newspaper reported that members of the local emergency response team said Israeli forces had allowed them access to the area, even though Metula was within a closed military zone.

The military established the zone in late September, shortly before launching a ground invasion of Lebanon to destroy Hezbollah’s weapons and infrastructure.

A second rocket attack on Thursday reportedly hit an agricultural area near Kibbutz Afek, about 65 kilometers (40 miles) southwest of Metullah and 28 kilometers from the Lebanese border.

According to the military, a total of 55 projectiles were fired in the early afternoon toward the Western Galilee region, where the kibbutz is located, as well as the Central and Upper Galilee. Some of the projectiles were intercepted, while others fell into open areas.

According to Haaretz news agency, 60-year-old Mina Hassoun and her 30-year-old son Karmi were killed when a rocket hit their olive grove where they were harvesting olives.

Magen David Adom Ambulance Service said a 70-year-old man also suffered minor injuries from shrapnel and was taken to Ramban Hospital.

“We were called to the olive grove and saw a man in his 30s lying unconscious on the ground,” MDA paramedics Mazor and Yishai Leby told The Jerusalem Post. .

“We conducted further searches and began resuscitation efforts, during which we discovered another injured person, also in critical condition with multisystem injuries. We treated her and began resuscitation efforts. Unfortunately, we had no choice but to declare both of them dead,” they said.

Meanwhile, the Irish military commander announced on Wednesday night that a UN peacekeeping base in southern Lebanon, where Irish troops are stationed, had been hit by a rocket fired at Israel.

Lt. Gen. Sean Clancy said the rockets landed in an uninhabited area at Camp Shamrock, 7 kilometers from the Israeli border, causing minimal damage to the ground and causing no casualties.

Irish Prime Minister Simon Harris said: “Thankfully everyone is safe, but it is completely unacceptable that something like this happened. Peacekeepers are protected under international law and we have a responsibility to ensure their protection. It’s on all sides.”

The deadly rocket attack in northern Israel came as two US special envoys were meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem to discuss a possible ceasefire agreement to end the war with Hezbollah. Ta.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told Amos Hochstein and Brett McGuirk that the main issue is Israel’s ability to “thwart all threats to our security from Lebanon and return the population safely to their homes,” Netanyahu said. the Prime Minister said in a statement.

Israel has launched an offensive against Hezbollah, which it bans as a terrorist organization, after nearly a year of cross-border fighting stemming from the Gaza war.

Hezbollah announced on October 7, 2023, a day after its ally Hamas’ deadly attack on Israel, that tens of thousands of residents of Israel’s northern border areas were displaced by rocket attacks launched by Hezbollah in support of Palestinians. He said he wanted to ensure his safe return.

Since then, more than 2,800 people have been killed in Lebanon, including 2,200 in the past five weeks, and 1.2 million others have been displaced, according to Lebanese authorities.

Israeli authorities say more than 60 people have been killed in Hezbollah rocket, drone and missile attacks in northern Israel and the occupied Golan Heights.

The Israeli military announced early Thursday that its troops continued operations inside southern Lebanon and that aircraft had struck dozens of Hezbollah targets across Lebanon.

Meanwhile, the Lebanese Ministry of Health announced that Israeli airstrikes killed six emergency workers in three southern towns.

Four members of the civil defense branch of the Hezbollah-affiliated Islamic Health Association, which provides emergency services, were killed when Israeli forces targeted a gathering point at the Derdogaya intersection, the statement said.

The ministry said a fifth IHS paramedic was killed in an airstrike on a vehicle in Deir al-Zahrani, and in Zefta, an EMT from the Islamic Risala Scout Association, which is affiliated with the Hezbollah-aligned Amal movement. died.

There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military. But since it ramped up its air campaign against Hezbollah five weeks ago, dozens of paramedics and other first responders have been killed or injured.

The military has previously accused Hezbollah of using ambulances to transport weapons and fighters. IHS denies any connection to military operations.

There was another Israeli attack near Baalbek in the eastern Bekaa Valley, a day after Israeli forces ordered the evacuation of the entire city and two neighboring towns.

Lebanese National News Agency (NNA) reported that one woman was killed in a strike in the Kayal area.

A further six people were killed when a house was blown up in Makuna, five kilometers northeast of Baalbek but not included in the evacuation zone.