Israel said that its air force was carrying out extensive strikes on southern Lebanon on Wednesday in response to a deadly rocket attack, a significant escalation in recent fighting that threatened to derail diplomatic efforts to stem cross-border tensions.
The rocket attack from Lebanon was the second in two days to cause casualties in northern Israel and was the latest in months of tit-for-tat strikes across the border that have fueled fears about a wider war as Israel battles Hamas in Gaza. There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but suspicion quickly fell on Hezbollah, the Lebanese militia and ally of Hamas that has regularly fired into Israel.
One woman was killed and at least eight others were wounded in rocket fire near the city of Safed, according to Magen David Adom, Israel’s nonprofit emergency medical service.
Within hours, Israel’s military said that it was carrying out strikes in Lebanon. Soon, images and videos of the strikes started coming in from Lebanese broadcasters, and the Hezbollah-owned Al Manar news station reported that at least four people had been killed.
Benny Gantz, a member of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s emergency war cabinet, described the morning’s rocket attack as “a difficult event for which the response will come soon and powerfully.” He suggested that Israel could strike at Lebanese military targets in addition to those belonging to Hezbollah.
“It is important that we be clear — the one responsible for the fire from Lebanon is not only Hezbollah or the terrorist elements that carry it out, but also the government of Lebanon and the Lebanese state that allows the shooting from its territory,” Mr. Gantz said, adding: “There is no target or military infrastructure in the area of the north and Lebanon that is not in our sights.”
The latest strikes threatened to derail diplomatic efforts by the United States and others to defuse the cross-border tensions. A Western diplomat said on Tuesday that France had presented a proposal to Israel, Lebanon’s government and Hezbollah. The French proposal details a 10-day process of de-escalation and calls for Hezbollah to withdraw its fighters to a distance of 10 kilometers (six miles) from Lebanon’s border with Israel, according to the diplomat, who is involved in the talks and who requested anonymity to discuss the sensitive deliberations.
In recent weeks, Israel has warned that unless a diplomatic solution is reached, it would have to use military force to stop Hezbollah’s attacks in order to allow for tens of thousands of Israelis to return to their homes. Mr. Netanyahu has been wary of opening a second front while the Israeli military continues to press its invasion of Gaza, but has faced calls from hard-liners in his government to take stronger action.
Avigdor Liberman, a former top adviser to Mr. Netanyahu who now leads an opposition party, accused the government of waving a “white flag” at Hezbollah by failing to take strong enough steps to stop the rocket attacks.
“The war cabinet surrendered to Hezbollah and lost the north,” he wrote on social media on Wednesday.
Israel’s military said that rockets from Lebanon had landed in the areas of Netu’a, Manara and a military base in northern Israel. In Safed, a city of nearly 40,000 people that has four military bases nearby, according to Tamir Engel, a spokesman for the city, rocket warnings are not uncommon but fatalities and direct hits are rare.
In early January, Hezbollah fired rockets toward a small military base not far from the city. The group said then that it was retaliating for the assassination days earlier of a senior Hamas commander in Lebanon; Israel said at the time that the attack had caused no casualties.
Safed sits about eight miles south of the border with Lebanon, far enough away that it was not included in mandatory evacuation orders issued when cross-border hostilities flared after the deadly Hamas-led Oct. 7 attacks on Israel.
Israel and Hezbollah have engaged in near-daily cross-border strikes ever since. The clashes have displaced more than 150,000 people from their homes on both sides of the Israel-Lebanon border.
Hwaida Saad, Euan Ward and Adam Sella contributed reporting.
— Gabby Sobelman and Cassandra Vinograd
