Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah movement said on Thursday that five of its fighters, including the son of a senior lawmaker, had been killed in fighting on the Israel-Lebanon border since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas.
Abbas Raad, son of Hezbollah’s parliamentary bloc chief Mohammed Raad, was “martyred on the way to Jerusalem,” the group said in a statement – the term it has since used to describe the deaths of its members by Israeli fire to announce The war began on October 7th.
It issued separate statements with the identities and photos of four other militants who were also killed.
A source close to the family, who requested anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media, told AFP that Abbas Raad “along with a number of other Hezbollah members” died in an Israeli attack on a house in Beit, southern Lebanon Yahun was killed on Wednesday.
Advertisement – Scroll to continue
Lebanon’s official National News Agency said on Wednesday that “four people were killed in an airstrike by the Israeli enemy … on a house in Beit Yahun.” The victims were not identified.
Since the Israel-Hamas war began on October 7, there have been escalating exchanges of fire on the Lebanon-Israel border, particularly between Israel and the Shiite Muslim movement Hezbollah, but also Palestinian groups, fueling fears of a wider conflagration.
The Israeli army said in statements Wednesday evening that it had struck a number of Hezbollah targets and sources of fire from Lebanon, including a Hezbollah “terror cell” and infrastructure.
Advertisement – Scroll to continue
According to an AFP tally, 107 people have been killed on the Lebanese side since the cross-border exchange began. At least 75 are Hezbollah fighters, but at least 14 civilians, including three journalists, were also among the victims.
Seven Hezbollah fighters were also killed in Syria.
According to the authorities, six soldiers and three civilians were killed on the Israeli side.
Advertisement – Scroll to continue
The attack came just hours after the announcement of a four-day ceasefire in Gaza between Israel and Hamas, an ally of Hezbollah.
Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, who visited Beirut on Wednesday, warned in an interview that conditions in the region will not remain the same as before the ceasefire and when the ceasefire between Hamas and Israel begins, but “not lasts.” The scope of the war will expand.
bur/lg/lb