Israel’s military has said it has struck Hezbollah targets in Lebanon, after the Iranian-backed Shia group said it launched rockets and drones at the Israeli city of Haifa to avenge the killing of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Lebanon’s disaster management unit said 52 people were killed by Israeli strikes in the country on Monday.
There were no reports of casualties in Israel from Hezbollah’s fire, which the group said was retaliation for Khamenei’s “pure blood” and Israeli strikes in Lebanon since a ceasefire ended a war between them 15 months ago.
The Israeli defence minister vowed Hezbollah would pay a “heavy price”.
Israel Katz said he had ordered the Israeli military to “act forcefully” against the militia and political party, and that its leader Naim Qassem was now a “marked target for elimination”.
Lebanon’s Prime Minister, Nawaf Salam, condemned Hezbollah’s actions as “irresponsible” and said his government was immediately banning the group’s military activities.
It had been widely expected that Hezbollah, which has close financial and ideological ties to Iran, would join the conflict between Iran, Israel and the US.
The conflict has spread quickly across the Middle East since the joint US-Israeli attack on Iran’s leadership and armed forces on Saturday, with Iran responding by launching missiles and drones towards Israel and Gulf Arab states hosting US military bases.
Some Israeli families in Haifa have been sheltering from missile and rocket attacks in underground car parks [Reuters]
On Sunday, Hezbollah’s leader denounced Khamenei’s assassination as “the height of crime”. Qasem also declared that his group would “undertake our duty of confronting the aggression” by Israel and the US and not leave “the field of honour and resistance”.
At around 01:00 local time on Monday (23:00 GMT on Sunday), sirens sounded in several areas of northern Israel and explosions were heard.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said one projectile that crossed from Lebanon into Israeli territory was intercepted, and that several others fell in open areas. No injuries or damage were reported, it added.
Hezbollah’s military wing later announced that it had launched “a barrage of rockets and a swarm of drones” at a missile defence site south of Haifa in retaliation for Khamenei’s killing, as well as “repeated Israeli aggressions” since the November 2024 ceasefire ended a year-long conflict between them.
Israeli forces responded with a powerful wave of air and naval strikes on Beirut’s southern suburbs – known as Dahieh – where Hezbollah has a strong presence, and southern Lebanon at around 03:00.
The IDF said the strikes targeted senior Hezbollah operatives, command centres, weapons stores, and “terrorist infrastructure”. Hussein Meklad, the head of Hezbollah’s intelligence headquarters, was allegedly killed.
Lebanese officials said 52 people were killed by Israeli strikes on Monday [EPA]
Smoke plumes immediately rose into air above Dahieh. Streets were filled with smoke and screams as several fires erupted in buildings.
Roads near Beirut’s airport were also hit, leaving broken glass and debris lining the streets.
Bumper-to-bumper traffic stretched along the airport road and onto the main highways leading north as residents of the capital fled.
Zeinab, a teacher from the Dahieh, told the BBC she and her family were first woken by the news that Hezbollah had fired rockets at Israel.
“We tried to understand from the news where things might go and in the end we said, ‘let’s go back to sleep and in the morning we can decide if we need to leave or not’.”
Instead, the single mother was woken almost immediately by the explosions from Israeli strikes.
“The house was shaking around us… I was with my daughter and I told her, ‘we are dying. There is no chance for survival’.”
The two ran out into the street and away from their home: “We didn’t know where we were going or how. We ran on foot.”
Zeinab said she was angry about being pulled into another war.
“We shouldn’t have to live with this fear and anxiety for any reason… nor should our children carry the burden of a war that has nothing to do with them. We are done, we are exhausted.”
The IDF also ordered residents of more than 50 southern and eastern villages to evacuate, warning that it intended to carry out further strikes in them.
Some people in the south said they had already started to leave after Hezbollah’s rocket launch.
“It’s absolutely miserable,” a 55-year-old shop owner told the BBC in a voice message. “We were just sitting at home and then suddenly this happened.”
“We were shocked and we quickly packed and woke up the kids and got in the car. Now we’re stuck on blocked roads because of the massive displacement from the south.”
The father of three, who asked not to be named, said his parents who live in Dahieh were also “stuck and trying to get out”.
There were more heavy Israeli strikes in Beirut and southern Lebanon on Monday afternoon, which the IDF said hit more than 70 weapons storage facilities, launch sites and missile launchers.
In the northern Israeli border town of Metula, where the smashed ruins of a Lebanese village are clearly visible a few kilometres away, the streets were quiet on Monday.
Levav Weinberg and his family moved back there in July after evacuating their home during the last conflict with Hezbollah.
He said they slept in the safe room on Monday night, after sirens warned of the incoming rockets from Lebanon.
“Hezbollah rockets not same as Iranian rockets,” he told the BBC. “An Iranian rocket would probably smash the whole house. We all understand that Iran is the heart of all the bad groups around us.”
Levav said fighting Hezbollah meant fighting Iran.
“I hope they take care of that problem better than they took care of Hezbollah in south Lebanon – because even a year after the [ceasefire] agreement, we already see Hezbollah back.”
A young Israeli solider standing by a bomb shelter meanwhile said he backed his government’s decision to start a war with Iran “100%”.
The IDF’s chief of staff, Lt Gen Eyal Zamir, told officers on Monday morning that was the start of an “offensive campaign” against Hezbollah and that they should prepare for “many prolonged days of combat ahead”.
Later, he declared: “We will end this campaign with not just Iran being struck, but with Hezbollah suffering a devastating blow.”
IDF spokesperson Brig Gen Effie Defrin said it had already deployed troops to defend the border with Lebanon and for “all possibilities”.
Asked by a journalist whether Israel now planned a new ground invasion of southern Lebanon, he replied that “all options” were “on the table”.
Hezbollah supporters held a rally in support of Iran in Dahieh on Sunday, a day after Khamenei’s killing [EPA]
Lebanese President Joseph Aoun denounced the Israeli strikes while also warning against turning Lebanon into a battleground for conflicts “that do not concern us”.
He later chaired a cabinet meeting at Baabda Palace, where ministers also condemned the firing of rockets from Lebanese territory, saying it violated the November 2024 ceasefire agreement that ended a year-long war between Israel and Hezbollah.
Prime Minister Salam stressed that “the decision of war and peace” rested exclusively with the state, and said this “necessitates the immediate prohibition of all Hezbollah’s security and military activities as being outside the law, and obliging it to hand over its weapons”.
The move marked one of the clearest challenges yet to the Hezbollah’s long-standing parallel authority in Lebanon.
The head of Hezbollah’s parliamentary bloc, Mohammed Raad, said there was no justification for the “government to take impractical decisions against Lebanese who refuse occupation”.
“The Lebanese expected a decision banning aggression; instead, they face a decision banning the rejection of aggression,” he added.
Hezbollah, which is designated as a terrorist organisation by countries including the UK and US, has previously said its fighters will not disarm until Israel withdraws from southern Lebanon and stops its air strikes.
Hezbollah’s arsenal has long divided Lebanon, which is still scarred by its 1975–1990 civil war.
Calls for the group to lay down its weapons have grown louder since its last conflict with Israel, which began when Hezbollah fired rockets at Israeli positions in a disputed border area a day after Hamas attacked southern Israel on 7 October 2023.
Israel launched an intense air campaign and ground invasion against the group in September 2024, saying it wanted to ensure the safe return of residents displaced by the rocket attacks.
The war killed 4,000 Lebanese and 120 Israelis, and left Hezbollah significantly weakened. Qasem’s predecessor, Hassan Nasrallah, died in an Israeli strike in Dahieh.
Under the US- and French-brokered ceasefire, Hezbollah agreed to end its armed presence south of the Litani river, about 30km (20 miles) from the border with Israel. Israel also agreed to withdraw its forces from the area.
Since the truce, both sides have accused each other of violations.
Israel has accused Hezbollah of trying to recover its military capabilities, including in the south.
The IDF has also carried out near-daily strikes on targets it says are linked to Hezbollah, and its troops have continued to occupy at least five positions in southern Lebanon.
Additional reporting by David Gritten in London