At least six killed in Israeli strikes in southern Lebanon | Israel attacks Lebanon Newsnewsline24

Attacks come as Israel says it is close to taking over a key city in the south and before peace talks take place in Washington.

At least six people have been killed in a new wave of Israeli attacks in southern Lebanon, state media reports, as the Israeli military claims to have surrounded a main town there.

The state-run National News Agency (NNA) said one person was killed and nine others injured when fighter jets attacked the town of Bazouriyeh.

Elsewhere, Israeli air strikes killed one person in the town of Nabatiyeh El Faouqa and three others in the towns of Sir el Gharbiyeh and Choukine.

NNA said Israeli warplanes struck a centre of the International Committee of the Red Cross in the city of Tyre. One person injured in the attack was later pronounced dead. Several Red Cross vehicles were damaged.

Also in Tyre, the news agency said several people were killed in an air strike on an orchard, without providing a specific number.

Israeli artillery shelling was reported in the towns of Haniyeh, Qlaileh, Mansouri, Bayt Yahun, Tayr Harfa, Majdal Zoun, and Sama’ah in the south.

The Israeli army said it will have full operational control of the southern Lebanese town of Bint Jbeil within days, after claiming to have killed more than 100 Hezbollah fighters there over the past week in air strikes and “face-to-face” confrontations.

The announcement marks a significant advance in Israel’s ongoing invasion of southern Lebanon.

“The forces of the 98th Division have completed the encirclement of the town of Bint Jbeil and have begun an assault on it,” the Israeli military’s Arabic-language spokesman Colonel Avichay Adraee said on X.

Hezbollah said it has been engaged for days in fighting with Israeli forces in Bint Jbeil, 5km (3 miles) from the Israeli border. The town has long been both a symbolic and strategic flashpoint in confrontations between Israeli forces and the Iranian-backed group.

Bint Jbeil saw some of the fiercest fighting during the war in 2006, when Hezbollah’s resistance there became central to the group’s narrative of defiance. It was from the stadium in Bint Jbeil in 2000 that the group’s former chief Hassan Nasrallah delivered the “Liberation” speech, following Israel’s withdrawal from southern Lebanon after 22 years of occupation.

On Thursday, Hezbollah said it was engaged in “point-blank” clashes with Israeli forces in the town. Since then, the group has repeatedly reported the targeting of Israeli forces and vehicles there, most recently on Sunday with “intense clashes”.

On Monday, the NNA reported Israeli artillery shelling at the entrance to the town.

Beirut doesn’t have ‘much leverage’

The escalation in Bint Jbeil comes as diplomatic efforts to contain the cross-border fighting have increased over the past few days.

Israeli and Lebanese officials are set to hold talks on Tuesday in Washington to end the war.

Lebanon’s culture minister, Ghassan Salame, said the government is focused on securing an immediate halt to hostilities before any peace talks with Israel are held.

“We are talking about a preparatory meeting at ambassador level in order to produce a pause in military activity, if not a ceasefire, so the shelling and bombardment stop,” Salame told Al Jazeera.

“It’s a preliminary meeting taking place in Washington tomorrow,” he added, noting that Lebanon does not have “much leverage”.

Hezbollah joined the Middle East war after US-Israeli strikes assassinated Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei on February 28. Israel responded with massive strikes and a ground invasion.

At least 2,055 people have been killed and more than 6,550 others injured since Israel expanded its offensive in Lebanon on March 2.