Israeli forces kill two in Lebanon, ahead of truce monitors meeting

Israeli forces have killed two people in southern Lebanon a day before a committee monitoring a yearlong ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah was due to hold its next meeting.

Lebanon’s NNA news agency said two people were killed in the Israeli attack on a house in south Lebanon’s Kfar Dunin in Bint Jbeil on Tuesday.

The Israeli military said in a statement that it struck two Hezbollah operatives in the area, accusing one of being “an engineering terrorist in a structure that facilitated the organisation’s reestablishment efforts”.

The attacks come as the committee monitoring the ceasefire, which includes representatives from France, Israel, Lebanon, the United States, and the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) prepared to meet on Wednesday.

Israeli attacks have killed more than 300 people in Lebanon since the November 2024 ceasefire, including at least 127 civilians.

Israeli forces bombarded several parts of Lebanon, killing at least two other people earlier this week, and ordered the forced evacuation of at least four villages in the south and east of the country.

Another overnight attack reduced a multistorey building to rubble in an industrial area of Ghaziyeh town, near the coastal city of Sidon, according to a video verified by media and a photographer from the AFP news agency.

In a statement earlier on Tuesday, Lebanese President Joseph Aoun said, “Israel’s continued attacks aim to thwart all efforts made locally, regionally and internationally to stop the ongoing Israeli escalation, despite the response shown by Lebanon to these efforts at various levels”.

Beirut-based security affairs analyst Ali Rizk told media the recent attacks come as no surprise following last week’s meeting between US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida.

“There had been reports that Israel got a green light to escalate against Hezbollah,” Rizk told media.

‘Difficult and dangerous conditions’

The spokesperson for the UN secretary-general, Stephane Dujarric, told a media briefing in New York on Tuesday that Israeli attacks are continuing in close proximity to UNIFIL peacekeepers stationed along the Blue Line, which demarcates the de facto border between Israel, Lebanon, and the occupied Golan Heights.

“We are aware that Israeli strikes carried out late Monday night following evacuation orders on targets, reportedly linked to Hezbollah and Hamas,” Dujarric said.

“The strikes occurred in areas north of the Litani River, including in western Bekaa, in Lebanese territory in southern Lebanon.”

Dujarric added that the UNIFIL peacekeepers detected “three air strikes in their areas of operations” on Monday as well as “several fighter aircraft activities above UNIFIL.”

“In addition, our peacekeepers reported multiple instances of direct fire originating from [Israeli army] positions south of the Blue Line, including small arms fire impacting the Kfar Shouba area, a Merkava tank fire near Shab’a, and a small arms fire impacting near a UN position near Kfar Shouba,” Dujarric said.

UN Undersecretary-General for Peace Operations Jean-Pierre Lacroix, who is visiting Lebanon currently, said on X that he met with UNIFIL peacekeepers who are “carrying out their mandated tasks under increasingly difficult and dangerous conditions”.

Lacroix is set to meet Lebanese officials on Wednesday.

Later this week, Lebanon’s cabinet will convene to discuss the army’s progress in disarming Hezbollah, a plan launched under heavy US pressure and amid fears of expanded Israeli strikes.

The army was expected to complete the disarmament south of the Litani River, about 30km (20 miles) from the border with Israel, by the end of 2025, before tackling the rest of the country.

In his statement, Aoun said the government’s plan to “extend its authority over the south of the Litani” has been “implemented by the Lebanese army with professionalism, commitment and precision”.