BEIRUT: Urgent calls for foreigners to leave Lebanon intensified on Sunday, with France warning of an “extremely precarious” situation as Iran and its allies prepare to respond to a major massacre blamed on Israel.
Lebanon's Iran-backed Hezbollah movement, which has been firing back at Israeli forces almost daily since the Gaza war broke out in October, has announced that its fighters fired rockets into northern Israel overnight.
The Israeli military said it fired 30 missiles from Lebanon and intercepted most of them.
As Israel is on high alert in anticipation of a major military action from pro-Tehran militant groups including Hezbollah and Hamas, medics and police reported two people were killed in a knife attack on the outskirts of Tel Aviv on Sunday.
The attacker, a Palestinian from the occupied West Bank, was “drugged” by police and taken to hospital, where he later died.
Meanwhile, Israeli forces have continued their offensive against the Gaza Strip, witnesses and officials in the Hamas-controlled area said, with no sign of an end to Israel's nearly 10-month offensive against the island.
France, Canada and Jordan are the latest countries to call on their citizens to leave Lebanon.
“Given the extremely uncertain security context, French citizens are 'urgently asked' to avoid travelling to Lebanon and those already in the country 'to make immediate arrangements to leave… as soon as possible,'” the Paris-based foreign ministry said.
The United States and the United Kingdom have issued similar warnings.
Several Western airlines have suspended flights to the region.
Qatar Airways said on Sunday that “due to recent developments in Lebanon” the Doha-Beirut route “will operate only during daytime” until at least Monday.
The killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran on Wednesday, hours after Israel assassinated the military leader of Hezbollah in Beirut, prompted promises of retaliation from Iran and the so-called “Axis of Resistance” group of Tehran-backed militias.
Israel, which has been blamed by Hamas, Iran and others for the attack that killed Haniyeh, has not commented directly on the matter.
Israel's offensive in the Gaza Strip has killed at least 39,550 people, according to the territory's health ministry.
Haniyeh, Hamas' political chief, leads the group's talks in an effort to end the war.
His killing has raised questions about the continued viability of efforts by Qatar, Egypt and the United States to broker a peace and exchange hostages and prisoners.
In the Gaza Strip, fighting continued on Sunday.
The Palestinian Red Cross says officials have found eight bodies in a residential building in the Jabaliya refugee camp in northern Gaza after an Israeli airstrike.
At least five people were killed and 16 wounded in an Israeli drone attack on a tent housing displaced Palestinians inside the medical center, doctors at the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in central Gaza said. An attack on a nearby house in the same area also killed three people.
On Saturday, Israeli Civil Defense attacked a school that had been turned into a makeshift shelter, killing at least 17 people. Israel claimed the shelter was being used by terrorist groups.
An AFP correspondent reported that the Israeli military carried out airstrikes and artillery fire early Sunday in and around Gaza City, while witnesses reported more shooting, artillery fire and at least two more airstrikes in areas south of the city.
The Israeli military said its air force hit “approximately 50 terrorist targets across the Gaza Strip” in the past 24 hours.
Israel's ally the United States said it would move warships and fighter jets to the region to protect US personnel and defend Israel.
Analysts told AFP that a comprehensive joint operation between Iran and its allies was likely, while Tehran said it expected Hezbollah to launch attacks deeper inside Israel and no longer be limited to military targets.
Asked by reporters whether US President Joe Biden thought Iran would withdraw, he said: “I hope so. I don’t know.”
Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi will travel to Tehran on Sunday to meet with his Iranian counterpart, his ministry said.
Haniyeh's killing “has exposed the Middle East to its greatest danger in years,” the International Crisis Group (ICG) think tank said in a report released Saturday.
“There is a high risk of escalation,” with a risk of miscalculation leading to “unrestricted war … more likely than in April,” the report added.
On April 13, Iran launched its first direct strike on Israeli soil, launching a series of drones and missiles, most of which were intercepted, after the strike killed Revolutionary Guards forces at the Tehran consulate in Damascus.
The ICG said achieving a “prolonged ceasefire” in Gaza was the “best way to significantly reduce tensions in the region.”
Hamas officials, analysts and some protesters in Israel accuse Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of prolonging the war to protect his ruling far-right coalition.
Netanyahu told his cabinet on Sunday that he was making “every effort” to repatriate the hostages and was prepared to “do whatever it takes” to do so.
