Deaths after Israel air strike hits Beirut suburb

Israel launched a deadly airstrike on the Lebanese capital Beirut days after 12 children were killed in an attack blamed on the Iran-backed Hezbollah group.

The government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to take revenge for the killings in the occupied Golan Heights region.

It is not known if there will be further Israeli strikes.

There are fears that months of fighting between Israel and Lebanon's Hezbollah, which supports Hamas in Gaza, could escalate into an all-out war.

Israel said it wanted to send a “very strong message” but war could be avoided depending on Hezbollah's response.

The commander may have been killed

Eyewitnesses told AFP that they heard a loud bang and saw plumes of smoke. Several floors of the building were destroyed.

A source close to Hezbollah told AFP that an Israeli strike on Tuesday in a southern suburb of Beirut, which is a stronghold of the group, killed two people.

“Israel struck the southern suburbs of Beirut. Two people were killed in an Israeli strike,” said the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity after previously saying the group’s “commander-in-chief” was the target.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said they struck a Hezbollah commander who was responsible for the rocket fire on the Golan Heights last weekend.

The target is believed to be Muhsin Shukr, also known as Fuad Shukr, whom the IDF has identified as the leader of Hezbollah's precision-guided missile project. The US also said he played a “leading role” in the 1983 Beirut barracks bombing that killed 241 American servicemen.

Reuters reported sources who said Shukr survived. But Saudi news outlets said he had indeed died and his body was in a Beirut hospital, reports Times of Israel.

Lebanon's state-run National News Agency said the “hostile raid was directed near the Shura Council of Hezbollah,” the powerful Lebanese group's decision-making body, in the Beirut suburb of Haret Hreik.

The country's foreign minister, Abdallah Bouhabib, called on Hizbullah to be “proportionate” in response to avoid escalation.

On Saturday, 12 children were killed in an attack on the Druze Arab town of Majdal-Shams in the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights. Israel and the US have blamed Hezbollah, although the Iran-backed group has denied any link to the attack.

During a visit to Majdal Shams on Monday, Mr Netanyahu promised a “tough response”, reigniting fears that the war in Gaza could spill over into a wider regional conflagration.

The US and other countries have been pushing Israel to moderate its response, including potentially not striking busy Beirut, avoiding the city's airport, port and other major Lebanese infrastructure such as power plants and highways.

Speaking in Washington on Tuesday, White House press secretary Karin Jean-Pierre said President Joe Biden “believes (war) is avoidable.”

“Here we have to continue to be optimistic, I think it is important to have a diplomatic solution. We don't want to see escalation, we don't want to see all-out war.”

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