• Aljazeera

At least 14 people were killed and dozens injured in an Israeli strike in a Beirut suburb on Friday.

BEIRUT β€” Israel launched a rare airstrike that killed a senior Hezbollah military official in a densely populated southern Beirut neighborhood Friday, the Israeli army said. It was the deadliest such strike on Lebanon's capital in years, with Lebanese health authorities reporting at least 14 people killed and dozens more wounded in the attack.

The Israeli military's chief spokesman, Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, said the strike on Beirut's southern Dahiya district killed Ibrahim Akil, a commander of Hezbollah's elite Radwan Force, as well as 10 other Hezbollah operatives.

"We will continue pursuing our enemies in order to defend our citizens, even in Dahiya, in Beirut," said Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, describing the Israeli strike that targeted Akil as part of "a new phase of war."

Several hours later, Hezbollah confirmed Akil's death. In a statement, the Lebanese militant group described Akil as β€œa great jihadist leader” and said he had β€œjoined the procession of his brothers, the great martyr leaders, after a blessed life full of jihad, work, wounds, sacrifices, dangers, challenges, achievements, and victories.”

People gather near a damaged building Friday at the scene of an Israeli missile strike in the southern suburbs of Beirut.

Hours before the Israeli strike, Hezbollah hit northern Israel with 140 rockets as the region awaited the revenge promised by Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah over this week's mass explosions of pagers belonging to members of the Shiite militant group.

The Israeli military did not provide the identities of the other Hezbollah commanders allegedly killed in its strike on the crowded neighborhood just miles from downtown Beirut.

Lebanon's Health Ministry said at least 14 people were killed and 66 others were wounded in the attack, which leveled the apartment building where the Israeli army claimed Akil was meeting with other militants in the basement. Nine of the wounded were in serious condition, the ministry added.

It was not immediately clear if the Lebanese Health Ministry's death toll included Akil, who served on Hezbollah's highest military body, the Jihad Council. The United States sanctioned him for his alleged involvement in the 1983 bombing that killed more than 300 people at the U.S. Embassy in Beirut and the U.S. Marine Corps barracks.

Local networks in Lebanon broadcast footage showing first responders sifting through the rubble of a collapsed high-rise in the Jamous area in the heart of Dahiya, where Hezbollah conducts many of its political and security operations.

People stand on top of a damaged car Friday at the scene of a missile strike in the southern suburbs of Beirut.

Friday's airstrike β€” the deadliest such attack on a neighborhood of Beirut since Israel and Hezbollah fought a bloody, monthlong war in 2006 β€” hit during rush hour, as people were leaving work and children heading home from school.

At Beirut's St. Therese Hospital near the scene of the airstrike, crowds flocked to donate blood for those wounded in the attack.

"We are all together in this situation, so it's my obligation," said Hussein Harake, who lined up to donate blood.

From Israel, Gallant said he briefed senior military officials on the strike and vowed Israel would press on against Hezbollah "until we achieve our goal, ensuring the safe return of Israel's northern communities to their homes."

The strike came after Hezbollah launched one of its most intense bombardments of northern Israel in almost a year of fighting, largely targeting Israeli military sites. Israel's Iron Dome missile defense system intercepted most of the rockets. The few that got through sparked small fires but caused little damage and no Israeli casualties.

Hezbollah described its latest wave of rocket salvos as a response to past Israeli strikes on southern Lebanon β€” not as revenge for the mass explosions of Hezbollah pagers and walkie-talkies on Tuesday and Wednesday that killed at least 37 people and wounded 2,900 others in attacks widely attributed to Israel.

Israel has neither confirmed nor denied involvement in this week's sophisticated attacks, which signaled a major escalation in the past 11 months of simmering conflict along the Israel-Lebanon border.

People gather at the scene of an Israeli missile strike Friday in the southern suburbs of Beirut.

Israel and Hezbollah have traded fire regularly since Hamas' Oct. 7 assault on southern Israel ignited the Israeli military's devastating offensive in Gaza. But previous cross-border attacks have largely struck areas in northern Israel that had been evacuated and less-populated parts of southern Lebanon.

The last time Israel hit Beirut was in a July airstrike that killed senior Hezbollah commander Fuad Shukr.

"The attack in Lebanon is to protect Israel," Hagari said at a news conference following Friday's strike, describing both Shukr and Akil as the two military officials closest to Hezbollah leader Nasrallah.

Even as the world's attention turns to the surge in Israel-Hezbollah tensions, Palestinian casualties in the besieged Gaza Strip continued to mount.

Palestinian health authorities early Friday reported that 15 people, including children, were killed in Israeli strikes that targeted a family home and a group of people on the street in Gaza City. Israel's campaign in Gaza has already killed at least 41,000 Palestinians, according to the Gaza-based Health Ministry, which doesn't differentiate between fighters and civilians.

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