In recent weeks, Hamas ally Hezbollah has stepped up its attacks on northern Israel. (File)
Beirut, Lebanon:
Lebanese official media said an Israeli attack wounded three people in the country's east on Monday, with Hezbollah saying it had launched “dozens of Katyusha rockets” at an Israeli base in retaliation.
Israel and Lebanese Hezbollah have regularly exchanged cross-border fire since the Palestinian fighter group Hamas' unprecedented October 7 attack on southern Israel sparked war in the Gaza Strip.
In recent weeks, Hamas ally Hezbollah has stepped up its attacks on northern Israel and the Israeli army has pushed deeper into Lebanese territory.
“Enemy warplanes launched an attack on a factory in Sifri around 1:30 am this morning, wounding three civilians and destroying the building,” Lebanon's official National News Agency said.
Sifri is located in Lebanon's eastern Bekaa Valley, in the Baalbek area, a Hezbollah stronghold that Israel has attacked repeatedly in recent weeks, located about 80 kilometers from the Israel-Lebanon border.
The Israeli military said its warplanes “struck a Hezbollah military structure… deep in Lebanon,” referring to the location as “Safri.”
Lebanon's Iran-backed Hezbollah group said it had launched “dozens of Katyusha rockets” targeting “the headquarters of the Golan division… at the Nafah base” in the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights.
Hezbollah's attacks on Israel came “in response to the enemy's attack on the Bekaa region,” the report said.
Hezbollah later claimed a drone attack on forces in northern Israel, with the Israeli military saying “a UAV (drone) was identified entering the Metula area from Lebanon.”
The army also said that “fighter jets hit about fifteen (Hezbollah) military structures and terror infrastructure” in southern Lebanon.
Last month, a building in Sifri was the target of an Israeli attack, while the Israeli army said it had attacked Hezbollah sites in eastern Lebanon.
The intensifying exchanges have fueled fears of an all-out conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, which went to war in 2006.
At least 390 people have been killed in Lebanon in nearly seven months of cross-border violence, mostly fighters but also more than 70 civilians, according to an AFP tally.
On Sunday, official media in Lebanon said an Israeli attack on a southern village killed four relatives, with Hezbollah announcing retaliatory strikes.
Israel says 11 soldiers and nine civilians have been killed on its side of the border.
Tens of thousands of people have been displaced on both sides.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by Our staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
