Israel says it has struck Hezbollah arms smuggling sites along the Syria-Lebanon border

Israeli warplanes have struck Hezbollah arms smuggling sites near the Syrian-Lebanon border, the Israeli military said on Saturday, testing the gunfire. fragile, with old days of ending war that saw a continuous continuous fire.

The army said it struck areas used to smuggle weapons from Syria to Lebanon after the operation began, which the army said violated its terms. There was no immediate comment from Syrian authorities or Hezbollah.

Israeli warplanes have struck Hezbollah in Lebanon, citing ceasefire violations, several times since the accord began on Wednesday.

The ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah is silent war in Gazawhen the fighting is intense.

On Saturday, an Israeli vehicle strike killed five people, including three workers of the World Central Kitchen food aid organization, in Khan Yunis, Gaza, according to Muneer Alboursh, the Palestinian health office. The charity could not be reached for comment and did not comment on the incident on social media.

The Israeli military said it hit a vehicle carrying a number of people involved in an attack by Hamas on October 7, 2023. It said it was looking into the reported contact with the World Central Kitchen but said the vehicle was unmarked and did not communicate with the delivery of aid to the military as humanitarian organizations did during the war.

An eyewitness told CBS News that when two rescuers arrived to collect the bodies, they were killed in a second strike. Among the dead is Azem Abu Daqa, who is said to have been in charge of one of the organization’s kitchens.

At the Nasser hospital in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis, a woman held up a worker’s badge with the WCK logo, the word “contractor” and the name of one of the men said to have been killed in the strike. A lot of belongings – burnt phones, a watch and stickers with the WCK logo – were placed on the floor of the hospital.

This is the second time World Central Kitchen hit in an Israeli strike. In April, a picket strike killed seven workers, most of them immigrants. The Israeli military said it was a mistake.

The agreement between Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah, issued by the United States and Francecalls for a two-month ceasefire in which troops will withdraw north of the Litani River in Lebanon and Israeli troops must return to their side of the border.

The repeated outbursts of violence – despite reports of serious casualties – reflected the uneasy nature of the ceasefire that had appeared to be holding. While Israel accuses Hezbollah of violating the ceasefire, Lebanon has similarly accused Israel in the days since it went into effect.

Many Lebanese, some of the 1.2 million displaced by the conflict, have been streaming south to their homes, despite warnings from the Israeli and Lebanese military to stay away from certain areas.

The army said earlier on Saturday that its soldiers, who remained in southern Lebanon until they gradually withdrew in a period of 60 days, were working to isolate the “suspects” in the region, without elaborating, he said that the soldiers found and confiscated weapons that were found hidden. in the mosque.

Israel says it reserves the right under the resolution to stop fighting any perceived violations.

Hezbollah began attacking Israel on Oct. 8, 2023, in collaboration with the Palestinian militant group Hamas and its attack on southern Israel the day before. Israel and Hezbollah continued a low-level firefight across the border for about a year, until Israel escalated its war with a sophisticated attack that blew up hundreds of pagers and walkie-talkies used by Hezbollah fighters.

More than 3,760 people have been killed by Israeli fire in Lebanon during the war, most of them civilians, according to Lebanese health officials. The war killed more than 70 people in Israel – more than half of them civilians – and dozens of Israeli soldiers fighting in southern Lebanon.

The war in Gaza began with an attack by Hamas in October 2023, in which the army killed 1,200 people, most of them civilians, and kidnapped another 250 people. Israeli retaliation has killed more than 44,000 Palestinians, according to local health officials, who do not distinguish between civilians and combatants by number but say more than half of the dead are women and children.

Debora Patta contributed to this report.