Hezbollah clashes with Israeli soldiers after east Lebanon raid, second in days

Hezbollah said on Monday its fighters clashed with Israeli troops in eastern Lebanon during an Israeli airborne raid overnight, in what would be the second such operation in the area in recent days, as the war between Israel and the Iran-backed group entered a second week.

A Hezbollah statement said its fighters "confronted the helicopters and the infiltrating forces with appropriate weapons".

Lebanon was pulled into the regional war when Hezbollah, founded by Iran's Revolutionary Guards in 1982, opened fire to avenge the killing of Iran's former supreme leader Ali Khamenei, igniting a new Israeli offensive against the group.

The Israeli military kept up its airstrikes in the Hezbollah-controlled southern suburbs of Beirut on Monday, sending plumes of smoke across the city. It reiterated warnings to its residents to leave, and announced it would act against a Hezbollah financial institution, Al-Qard Al-Hassan.

Nearly 400 people have been killed in Lebanon by Israeli strikes since March 2, Lebanon's health ministry reported on Sunday, including at least 83 children and 42 women.

Israel's military announced on Sunday that two Israeli soldiers had been killed in southern Lebanon, the first casualties in the Israeli army since the war began.

In its statement, Hezbollah said its fighters had observed 15 helicopters flying over eastern Lebanon just after midnight, dropping Israeli troops who were observed approaching Lebanese territory from an area on the Syrian side of the border.

The northern part of Lebanon's eastern Bekaa region is one of the Shia Muslim group's political and security strongholds.

The Israeli military claimed that it was unaware of any clash with Hezbollah fighters in eastern Lebanon.

The military carried out an airborne raid in the same area, near the village of Nabi Chit, overnight Friday-Saturday. Lebanon's health ministry said 41 people were killed in Israeli attacks in Nabi Chit on Saturday.

The Israeli military said that raid was an operation to seek the remains of Ron Arad, an Israeli air force navigator missing in Lebanon since 1986 but no findings related to him were recovered.

Hundreds of thousands of people in Lebanon have fled their homes since the start of the war, pouring out of the predominantly Shia south and southern suburbs of Beirut, known as Dahiyeh (Arabic for suburb).

Israel has also struck outside those areas.

On Sunday, an Israeli drone strike hit a hotel in Beirut's seafront Raouche district. The Israeli military said the strike killed five senior commanders of what it described as the Lebanon Corps of Iran's Revolutionary Guards Quds Force.

The Israeli military has sent more troops into southern Lebanon since the start of the war, establishing what it claims to be forward defensive positions to guard against Hezbollah attacks into Israel.

Israel has occupied five positions in southern Lebanon since the last round of fighting with Hezbollah in 2024.