Beirut: An Israeli strike on a refugee camp in north Lebanon has killed Hamas official Saeed Atallah Ali and his family, the militant group said Saturday. The early morning strike came a day after another Israeli airstrike cut off a main highway linking Lebanon with Syria, leaving two huge craters on either side of the road.
Hamas said in a statement that the early Saturday strike on the Beddawi refugee camp struck the home of Saeed Atallah Ali, an official with Hamas's military wing, the Qassam Brigades. Ali's wife, Shaymaa Azzam, and their two daughters, Zeinab and Fatima — whom the statement described as children — were also killed in the attack.
Beddawi camp is near the northern city of Tripoli. It was the first such strike on the camp in recent weeks that saw intensified exchanges between Israel and Hamas. Israel has killed several Hamas officials in Lebanon since the Israel-Hamas war began in October 2023.
Israel began a ground incursion Tuesday into Lebanon against the Hezbollah militant group. The Israeli military said nine soldiers have died in the conflict in southern Lebanon. Nearly 2,000 people have been killed in Lebanon since then, most of them since September 23, according to the Lebanese Health Ministry.
Israel and Hezbollah have traded fire across the Lebanon border almost daily since the day after Hamas' cross-border attack on October 7, 2023, which killed 1,200 Israelis and took 250 others hostage. Israel declared war on the Hamas militant group in the Gaza Strip in response. As the Israel-Hamas war reaches the one-year mark, more than 41,000 Palestinians have been killed in the territory, and just over half the dead have been women and children, according to local health officials.
Israel's army claimed to eliminate 250 Hezbollah members, including its commander Mohammed Rashid Sakafi. The air attack on Beirut, part of a wider assault that has driven more than 1.2 million Lebanese from their homes, was reported to have targeted the potential successor to the leader of Iran-backed Hezbollah, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, killed by Israel a week ago. Hashem Safieddine's fate was unclear and neither Israel nor Hezbollah have offered any comment.
Amid hostilities in Lebanon, Israel is also weighing options in its response to Iran's ballistic missile attack on Tuesday, which Iran had carried out in response to Israel's military action against Hezbollah. Oil prices have risen on the possibility of an attack on Iran's oil facilities as Israel pursues its goals of pushing back Hezbollah militants in Lebanon and eliminating their Hamas allies in Gaza.
(with AP inputs)
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