Israel warns 2 villages in southern Lebanon to evacuate ahead of strikes

TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — The Israeli military has warned two villages in southern Lebanon to evacuate buildings close to what they said are Hezbollah sites, as tensions between Israel and militant groups escalate.

At least 14 people have been killed in Lebanon in the past day by Israeli strikes against what the military said were militant sites belonging to groups associated with Hezbollah and Hamas.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below.

SIDON, Lebanon (AP) — An Israeli airstrike on a car in southern Lebanon on Wednesday killed one person and wounded 11 including students aboard a nearby bus, the Health Ministry and state media said.

The strike in the village of Tiri came hours after an Israeli drone attack on the Palestinian refugee camp of Ein el-Hilweh in southern Lebanon killed 13 people and wounded several others. The Tuesday night strike was the deadliest among scores of Israeli attacks since a ceasefire in the Israel-Hezbollah war a year ago.

State-run National News Agency said a school bus with students happened to be passing near the car that was hit Wednesday morning. The bus driver and several students were wounded, the report said. The identity of the person who died in the car wasn’t immediately clear. The Israeli military did not comment Wednesday.

In the Ein el-Hilweh refugee camp, just outside the port city of Sidon, life appeared normal Wednesday but Lebanese authorities prevented journalists from entering.

At the scene of the strike, paramedics searched for human remains around a wall that was stained with blood. Several cars were burnt and broken glass and debris littered the ground.

On Tuesday night, the Israeli military said it struck a Hamas training compound that was being used to prepare an attack against Israel and its army. It added that the Israeli army would continue to act against Hamas wherever it operates.

Hamas condemned the attack and denied in a statement that the sports playground that was hit was its training compound.

Palestinian factions in Lebanon’s 12 refugee camps earlier this year began handing over their weapons to the Lebanese state. The government has said that it will also work on disarming Hezbollah but Hezbollah has rejected it as long as Israel continues to occupy several hills along the border and carries out almost daily strikes.

The U.S. has recently increased pressure on Lebanon to work harder on disarming Hezbollah and canceled a planned trip to Washington this week by Lebanese army commander Gen. Rudolph Haikal.

A senior Lebanese army officer told The Associated Press that U.S. officials were angered by an army statement on Sunday that blamed Israel for destabilizing Lebanon and blocking the Lebanese military deployment in south Lebanon. The officer spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to speak publicly.

The latest Israel-Hezbollah war began Oct. 8, 2023, a day after Hamas attacked southern Israel, after Hezbollah fired rockets into Israel in solidarity with Hamas. Israel launched a widespread bombardment of Lebanon two months ago that severely weakened Hezbollah, followed by a ground invasion.

That war, the most recent of several conflicts involving Hezbollah over the past four decades, killed more than 4,000 people in Lebanon, including hundreds of civilians, and caused an estimated $11 billion worth of destruction, according to the World Bank. In Israel, 127 people died, including 80 soldiers.

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Mroue reported from Beirut.