The Israeli Air Force conducted a large wave of airstrikes on Hezbollah targets in five villages across southern Lebanon on Thursday evening, after issuing evacuation warnings to civilians in the area.
The strikes were on a much broader scale than the hundreds of previous, smaller strikes Israel has carried out to prevent Hezbollah's violations of the ceasefire terms.
The Lebanese Health Ministry reported that one person was killed and nine others were wounded in the Israeli strikes on Thursday.
The escalation followed numerous reports in recent days that Israel was growing increasingly concerned about the pace of the terror group's rearmament.
Lebanese President Joseph Aoun sharply condemned the strikes, calling them a "fully-fledged crime not only according to the provisions of international humanitarian law… but also a heinous political crime."
Aoun claimed that every time Lebanon expresses readiness to negotiate with Israel, it "intensifies its aggression against Lebanese sovereignty, boasts of its contempt for Security Council Resolution 1701, and persists in violating its commitments under the understanding to cease hostile actions."
"Israel has spared no effort to demonstrate its rejection of any negotiated settlement between the two countries… Your message has been received," he said.
Israeli officials didn't immediately comment on the airstrikes but a senior IDF official told Channel 12 News that they were "just a preview" of Israel's response if Hezbollah is not disarmed, as the Lebanese government has vowed.
"If the Lebanese army does not disarm Hezbollah and fails to meet the demands of the ceasefire, Israel, with US backing, will attack Hezbollah targets across Lebanon, including in Beirut," the official warned.
The report added that Israel sent Lebanon an ultimatum to step up the disarmament effort or face a new, broad IDF operation in Lebanon.
The airstrikes followed formal evacuation warnings by IDF Arabic Spokesman Col. Avichay Adraee, who urged civilians to remain at least 500 meters from the targeted buildings.
"Prior to the strikes, steps were taken to mitigate harm to civilians, including issuing warnings to evacuate, the use of precise munition, aerial surveillance, and additional intelligence," the IDF said.
Warnings were issued for sites in the towns of Kfar Dounine, Zawtar al-Sharqiyah, Ayta al-Jabal, Taybeh, and Tayr Debba, the village farthest away from the Israeli border at a distance of some 24 km (15 miles).
The Israeli military later announced that it struck "terrorist infrastructure and several weapon storage facilities belonging to the Radwan Force," Hezbollah's elite unit that was previously tasked with preparing to invade and capture northern Israel in a future war.
"The weapons storage facilities were constructed in the center of civilian-populated areas. This is yet another example of the Hezbollah terrorist organization's strategy to cynically and brutally exploit Lebanese civilians as human shields as it operates out of civilian areas."
Earlier in the day, the IDF also attacked terrorists who were operating at a site "belonging to Hezbollah's Construction Unit in the Tyre area," which had been used to "manufacture equipment employed by Hezbollah terrorists to rebuild terrorist infrastructure."
Republished with permission from All Israel News