Israel and Hamas at war, day 94 | Antony Blinken expected in Tel Aviv, Hezbollah military leader killed in Lebanon

The head of American diplomacy, Antony Blinken, is expected in Israel to try to obtain a de-escalation of the war in Gaza and prevent its contagion in Lebanon, where, according to a security source, an Israeli strike killed a military leader of the Hezbollah.

This military official “played a leading role in directing operations” in southern Lebanon, where cross-border exchanges of fire are almost daily between the pro-Iranian Lebanese movement and the Israeli army, said this source. According to her, he was killed in the village of Kherbet Selm, about ten kilometers from the border with Israel.

The rise in tension in this area is fueling fears of a regional conflagration, while Israel’s war against Palestinian Hamas in the Gaza Strip has entered its fourth month.

The US Secretary of State, whose country is Israel’s main supporter, warned that the conflict could “easily metastasize” at the end of the Qatari leg of his tour of the region on Sunday, the fourth since the start of the war.

According to American officials, Mr. Blinken wants to prevent Lebanon from being drawn into war, press Israel to enter a new military phase less costly in Palestinian lives and initiate a “difficult” dialogue on the post-war period.

Israel vowed to destroy Hamas after its unprecedented attack on its territory on October 7, which killed around 1,140 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP count based on the Israeli toll.

Around 250 people were kidnapped and taken to Gaza, including around 100 released in exchange for Palestinian prisoners during a truce in late November.

Qatar, which then played a key mediating role, is continuing its efforts to free the hostages still held, said the father of one of them, Ruby Chen, who met with Qatari leaders.

The Israeli offensive left 23,084 dead in Gaza, where Hamas took power in 2007, mainly civilians, according to a new report Monday from the Islamist movement’s Ministry of Health.

The bombings razed entire neighborhoods there, displaced 85% of the population and caused a catastrophic humanitarian crisis according to the UN.

“No safe place”

According to the Hamas Ministry of Health, Israeli operations, which continue without respite, have left 73 dead and 99 injured in the last 24 hours in central Gaza.

The Israeli army announced strikes in Khan Younes, the main city in the south of the besieged territory and the new epicenter of the fighting, killing “ten terrorists preparing to fire rockets at Israel”.

Monday morning, a strike in Rafah, at the southern tip of Gaza, also destroyed a car from which rescuers and residents were extracting bodies, according to AFPTV.

“We were told that Rafah was safe, but where is the security, there is no safe place, we don’t know what to do,” laments a witness, Mohammad Hejazy. Hundreds of thousands of Gazans have flocked to the city fleeing fighting further north.

Two journalists working for Al-Jazeera were killed there on Sunday by an Israeli strike on their vehicle, according to the Qatari channel. A third journalist on board, Hazem Rajab, was seriously injured.

Moustafa Thuraya – a freelance videographer who also works with AFP and other international media – and Hamza Waël Dahdouh were returning from reporting on the site of a strike.

The second is the son of the head of the Al-Jazeera bureau in the Palestinian territory, Waël Dahdouh, who already lost his wife and two of his children at the end of October in an Israeli strike.

The Israeli army took responsibility for the shooting, telling AFP that it had “hit a terrorist who was piloting a flying device posing a threat to the troops”, and that it was “aware of information according to which, during the strike, two other suspects who were in the same vehicle were also hit.”

These deaths bring to at least 79 the number of journalists and media professionals, mainly Palestinian, killed since October 7, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists.

International humanitarian organizations also continue to warn of the ongoing health disaster in the small, overpopulated and besieged territory.

In Deir al-Balah, in central Gaza, more than 600 patients at al-Aqsa hospital had to leave the premises amid “intensification of hostilities”, according to the World Health Organization.

High voltage border

The conflict has also increased violence to a level not seen in nearly 20 years in the West Bank, territory occupied by Israel since 1967.

Nine Palestinians were killed there on Sunday, including seven in an Israeli raid in Jenin, a stronghold of Palestinian armed factions in this territory where the violence also caused the death of a policewoman and an Israeli civilian.

On Israel’s northern border, the army again fired shots towards southern Lebanon on Monday morning, according to AFPTV images. During the night, she claimed to have carried out air raids against two Hezbollah sites.

Clashes in this area further intensified after the assassination attributed to Israel, Tuesday in a Hezbollah stronghold in Beirut, of Saleh al-Arouri, number two in Hamas, an organization classified as terrorist by the United States and the European Union. .

Since October 8, cross-border hostilities have left more than 180 dead in Lebanon, including more than 135 Hezbollah fighters, according to an AFP count.

In northern Israel, nine soldiers and five civilians were killed, according to authorities.