Following the demolition of two high-rise buildings in Dahiye, a bustling neighbourhood and a bastion for Hizbullah in south Beirut, an excavator was seen wrestling with heaps of debris that were once homes. The residences had to face four missile attacks on the previous Friday, after the Israeli armed forces found out that a below-ground room was hosting a discussion involving two top-tier leaders of the paramilitary group backed by Iran.
A local inhabitant recounted that the apartment they lived in, quite a few streets from the disaster site, was vehemently jolted by these missile strikes that the Israeli forces didn’t hesitate to admit their hand in. The casualty count still stands at 45, and includes Hizbullah leaders Ibrahim Aqil, Ahmed Wehbe, 14 Hizbullah militants, and ten civilians including women and children.
A stone’s throw from the destruction site, the Lebanese Red Cross had its volunteers and ambulances ready to ferry the injured. Nonetheless, a worker from the civil defence team opined that the possibility of finding any living soul amidst the ruins was rather slim.
A few hours later, the lives claimed under the debris included five individuals from the Hamdane family, and four from the Dakdouki family. Several are yet unaccounted for, and fragments of remains are now being subjected to DNA testing, as per reports from the Lebanese health department.
On Saturday afternoon, the Hizbullah-designated public works and transportation minister, Ali Hamieh, arrived at the Dahiye disaster site. He informed the media there that such an attack on a civilian property was tantamount to a “war crime”. He further accused Israel of pulling the region into an armed confrontation.
In Ghobeiry, close to the explosion site in Dahiye, a memorial service took place honouring three Hizbullah soldiers who tragically lost their lives in Friday’s assault. Notwithstanding the unexpected detonation of communication devices during Wednesday’s funeral, a vast throng of mourners gathered on Saturday. Among them were men bearing recent injuries, evidenced by visible wounds to their hands and eyes.
Following prayers and cries honouring Imam Hussein, Hizbullah and Palestine, the crowd bore the three caskets, each shrouded in the vivid yellow emblem of the group.
Friday’s offensive by Israel is just the latest in a series of disruptive security infractions suffered by Hizbullah in a calamitous week. Numerous members found themselves injured, with some suffering permanent disfigurement, in dual shockwaves emanating from Hizbullah’s booby-trapped communication devices, resulting in the death of 37 individuals.
Saturday evening saw Israeli forces wage an extensive onslaught on numerous locations across southern and eastern Lebanon, claiming at least one life, as per the Lebanese health ministry’s reports.
Sunday morning marked an aggressive response from Hizbullah, with over a hundred rockets and missiles launched into Israel, aiming at the Ramat-David military base and an airport in the vicinity of the northern city of Haifa in Israel. This attack marked the deepest offensive into Israeli territory since the commencement of the conflict.
Numerous airlines have halted services to Beirut, while a growing crisis in the region was suggested by UN envoy to Lebanon, Jeanine Harris, describing it as teetering on the verge of an impending disaster in a Sunday statement.