Israel strikes Beirut suburbs, deadly attacks on Gaza continue

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Six people were killed, including three children, and eleven wounded in an Israeli strike on a village in Lebanon's Baalbek region, the health ministry said in a statement.

Lebanon official media is reporting fresh strike on south Beirut's suburbs.

 An Israeli strike killed 10 Palestinians and wounded at least 20 others on Saturday at Abu Assi school, currently being used to house displaced families in western Gaza City's Shati refugee camp, medics told Reuters.

Hundreds of protesters marched in support of Palestinians in Rio on Saturday, in a demonstration aimed at world leaders about to converge on the city for a G20 summit.

The march, held peacefully under constant rain along Copacabana Beach, was watched by dozens of police and soldiers deployed as security for the summit to be held Monday and Tuesday.

The meeting will see heads of state and government, including US President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping, discuss coordination on international issues.

The Rio protesters, a few wearing keffiyeh scarves, held aloft the Palestinian flag and banners, including one reading "Break Brazil-Israel Relations" and demands that Israeli allies stop financing its military offensives in Gaza and in Lebanon.

"We're here to make a contrast with the G20 summit," said Tania Arantes, 60, from one of the Brazilian unions organizing the protest.

She said the march embraced a number of other leftist issues too, such as climate change, the fight against poverty and a demand to tax the super-rich, because the leaders at the summit "have economic control over nations they believe are subordinate in this globalised world."

Israel Herzog's office said it is canceling his planned visit to the UN’s COP29 climate conference, in Baku, Azerbaijan, citing "security consideration"  that followed a situational assessment.

More deadly Israeli strikes have hit Lebanon on Saturday. Lebanese media said that six people were killed in Khraybeh, in the Anti-Lebanon region, including four children., L'Orient Le Jour said.

At least five people have injured.

In Tyre, an Israeli drone struck a car and a motorcycle at the city's the northern entrance, the National News Agency reports.

The agency said the attack led to injuries.

An Italian air force plane took off on Saturday carrying more than 15 tons of humanitarian aid to be delivered to the population in Gaza, a defence ministry statement said.

The aid aboard the C-130J aircraft, which departed from the central Italian city of Pisa, had been collected by charity group Confederazione Nazionale delle Misericordie d'Italia, the statement said.

"Italy is doing and will continue to do everything possible to alleviate the suffering of the civilian population in Gaza," said Defence Minister Guido Crosetto, adding Italy did not forget those who are suffering and was committed to a de-escalation of the conflict.

The plane will fly to Larnaca airport in Cyprus after which all the materials it is carrying will be transferred to Gaza.

Earlier this year, Italy launched a flagship initiative dubbed Food for Gaza to help civilians there, and it has sent several consignments of aid to those hit by the war ravaging the Palestinian enclave. 

At least 16 Palestinians have been killed and many others wounded by Israeli attacks across the Gaza Strip on Saturday, medical sources have stated.

Many of the victims were killed in Rafah, al-Mawasi and several areas in Gaza City, Al Jazeera said.

The Israeli military has issued further evacuation orders for Beirut residents, ordering people to leave and distance themselves from buildings in the Haret Hreik and Al-Ghobeiry neighbourhoods.

Three Palestinians were killed and others were injured on Saturday afternoon after Israeli warplanes bombed a house in the Shujaiya area, east of Gaza City.

The bombed house reportedly belonged to the Samara family, Palestinian media said.

 Israeli forces conducted detained at least 12 Palestinians  across the West Bank overnight and into Saturday including former detainees, according to the Palestinian Prisoners Society and the Palestinian Authority’s Commission for Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs, as cited by Wafa.

The raids targeted several areas in the West Bank, including Hebron, Nablus, Jenin, Qalqilya, and Salfit.

Israeli forces carried out the raids across homes, threatening family members and destructing Palestinian property.

Israeli strikes on villages in south Lebanon killed at least two medics early on Saturday, the Lebanese health ministry said, as Beirut's southern suburbs were bombarded for a fifth consecutive day.

Airstrikes killed a medic in the town of Borj Rahal in the Tyre District, south of Lebanon, and strikes on an emergency response team in the southern town of Kfartebnit killed one medic and injured four others while two medics were missing.

Israel launched at least nine airstrikes on the Hezbollah-controlled southern suburbs of Beirut. Lebanese authorities had not yet reported casualties from these attacks.

Israel's military said the attacks had targeted Hezbollah infrastructure in the suburbs.

Two senior Islamic Jihad figures were killed in an Israeli strike on Syria on Thursday, said a source from the Palestinian group which has fought against Israel in Gaza alongside Hamas.

The source told AFP on Saturday that Abdel Aziz Minawi, a member of Islamic Jihad's political bureau, and the group's foreign relations chief Rasmi Abu Issa were killed in the strike on Qudsaya, in the Damascus area.

The health ministry in Gaza said on Saturday that at least 43,799 people have been killed in more than 13 months of Israeli war on the Palestinian territory.

The toll includes 35 deaths in the previous 24 hours, according to the ministry, which said 103,601 people have been wounded in the Gaza Strip since October 7 last year.

A new air strike targeted the southern suburbs of the Lebanese capital Beirut around midday on Saturday, according to AFPTV footage, after the area was hit earlier in the day.

AFPTV images showed a column of smoke rising over the suburbs, while Lebanon's state-run National News Agency reported a raid by "enemy aircraft" in the neighbourhood of Chiyah. Before the strike, Israeli army spokesman Avichay Adraee had urged residents of three neighbourhoods to leave the area.

Israel has reportedly carried out a "violent strike" on the Bir Al Abed area of the southern Beirut suburb of Dahieh, the New Arab's Rita El Jammal reports.

Israel has issued threats of an "attack in the near future" to residents of the Beirut suburbs of Haret Hreik, Ghobeiry and Burj al-Barajneh, as strikes on the Lebanese capital intensify.

Avichay Adreaee, the Israli military's Arabic-language spokesperson, issued the warning on X on Saturday.

The spokesperson attached a maps which specified the buildings Israel is intending to target, with his statement on X.

"You are located near facilities and interests affiliated with Hezbollah, which the IDF will work against in the near future. For your safety and the safety of your family members, you must evacuate these buildings and those adjacent to them immediately and stay away from them for a distance of no less than 500 meters," he said.

#عاجل إلى جميع السكان المتواجدين في منطقة الضاحية الجنوبية وتحديدًا في المباني المحددة في الخرائط المرفقة والمباني المجاورة لها في المناطق التالية:
🔸حارة حريك
🔸الغبيري
🔸برج البراجنة

⭕️أنتم تتواجدون بالقرب من منشآت ومصالح تابعة لحزب الله حيث سيعمل ضدها جيش الدفاع على المدى… pic.twitter.com/8vV9ZdN8ap

— افيخاي ادرعي (@AvichayAdraee) November 16, 2024

The Islamic Resistance in Iraq has claimed an early morning attack on the Israeli city of Eilat, saying its drones attacked "a vital target in the southern Israeli port city of Eilat twice this morning", Al Jazeera reported on Saturday.

The Times of Israel said earlier that projectile launched "from the east" set off rocket warning sirens in the Eilat area around 6am local time (3am GMT).

Israeli settlers have reportedly forced a Palestinian  family to evacuate their home in the village of Duma, south of Nablus, the Palestinian news agency Wafa said.

The head of the Duma village council, Suleiman Dawabsheh, told Wafa that the settlers used threats to forcibly move out the Ara'ara family from the Ein Duma area.

At least five Palestinians were killed by Israeli strikes on Gaza's southernmost city of Rafah, which injured several others.

At least three victims were killed in the Al-Janina area, east of the city, and two more in the Khirbet Al-Adas area, north of Rafah, according to the Palestinian news agency Wafa.

Strikes target Beirut suburbs, with at least three buildings damaged, chiefly n Haret Hreik.

Shortly before the attack, Israeli military spokesman Avichay Adraee posted on X a call for residents of the Haret Hreik suburb to evacuate.

"You are close to facilities and interests belonging to Hezbollah, against which the Israeli military will be acting with force in the near future," the post said in Arabic, identifying specific buildings and telling residents to move at least 500 metres away.

غارة عنيفة على #حارة_حريك بعد إنذار الإخلاء pic.twitter.com/sImqvdFOQQ

— Lebanese Forces News (@LebForcesNews) November 16, 2024