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2024-10-22 Syria-Lebanon-Iran
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Israeli Air Force pounds Hezbollah’s Beirut stronghold after civilians told to evacuate area
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[IsraelTimes] More than a dozen Israeli Arclight airstrike
...KABOOM! ...
s were said to hit Beirut’s southern suburbs on Monday night and in the early hours of Tuesday morning after the Israel Defense Forces accused Hezbollah of storing millions of dollars in a bunker underneath one of Leb
 ...an Iranian satrapy until recently ruled by Hassan Nasrallah situated on the eastern Mediterranean, conveniently adjacent to Israel. Formerly inhabited by hardy Phoenecian traders, its official language is now Arabic, with the usual unpleasant side effects. The Leb civil war, between 1975 and 1990, lasted a little over 145 years and produced 120,000 fatalities. The average length of a ceasefire was measured in seconds. The Lebs maintain a precarious sectarian balance among Shiites, Sunnis, and about a dozen flavors of Christians, plus Armenians, Georgians, and who knows what else? It is the home of the original Hezbollah, which periodically starts a war with the Zionist Entity, gets Beirut pounded to rubble, and then declares victory and has a parade. The Lebs have the curious habit of periodically murdering their heads of state or prime ministers...
’s largest hospitals amid a years-long financial crisis.
The strikes were launched after the IDF’s Arabic-language front man Lt. Col. Avichay Adraee instructed residents of several buildings in Beirut’s southern suburbs to evacuate the area, warning that they were "located near facilities and interests belonging to Hezbollah."
The military said earlier on Monday that it would continue striking Hezbollah targets with a focus on their financial infrastructure, after IDF front man Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said that Israel estimated there to be roughly "half a billion dollars in dollar bills and gold" in a bunker underneath the al-Sahel Hospital in the southern Beirut suburb known as Dahiyeh, where Hezbollah is largely based.
He warned that the Israeli Air Force was monitoring the compound, but stressed that Israel would not launch a strike on the hospital itself, as it is at war with Hezbollah, and not with the Lebanese people.
The hospital nevertheless said that it was evacuating its patients to a safer location, and director Fadi Alameh denied the allegations.
No, no! Certainly not!
made by the IDF and invited the Lebanese army to visit the site.
Alameh told the local al-Jadeed TV that the hospital, which has been in the area for 42 years, has underground rooms for surgery and has no ties to Hezbollah or any political group.
Following the calls to evacuate, residents of Beirut reported several loud explosions in the Dahiyeh area, and Lebanese media reported that at least 13 Israeli airstrikes had been launched in the Hezbollah bastion.
The Lebanese health ministry said that a preliminary toll showed that four people, including a child, were killed in the airstrikes near the country’s biggest public hospital, and 24 others were maimed.
The number provided by the health ministry does not differentiate between combatants and civilians.
The strike caused "significant damage to the hospital," the health ministry said, including to the entrance, "which is still operating and receives a large number of patients."
The health ministry also denied the IDF’s assertion that Hezbollah was storing half a billion dollars under the hospital.
Lebanon’s National News Agency reported at least three Israeli strikes on the Ouzai district of south Beirut. While most districts of Beirut’s southern suburbs had been emptied for almost a month in light of the escalation between Israel and the Iran-backed Hezbollah terror group, the densely packed residential area of Ouzai was still filled with people because it had never been targeted before.
Additional strikes were also reported in Haret Hreik, just south of Ouzai, and Hadath.
’NO ROOM FOR ESCAPE’
Hezbollah-affiliated rescuers told AFP they were looking for survivors amid the devastation in Ouzai, adding that the evacuation order, then the strike, caused "panic among residents" who "started to run in the streets."
"They did not leave any room for people to escape. The strike came closely after the warning," one said.
A Lebanese security official told AFP that the country’s national airline had to switch landing strips after Israeli strikes near Beirut’s only international airport hit close to the main runway.
"Middle East Airlines switched the runway it was using because the main runway is close to the site of the Ouzai strike," the official said, requesting anonymity to discuss sensitive matters.
AFPTV footage showed plumes of smoke rising from Beirut’s southern suburbs, with AFP correspondents also hearing several loud bangs before the strikes.
The footage also showed two strikes that caused a huge fire, with black smoke surrounding dissipating orange flames.
The strikes came as the IDF continued to hammer an array of Hezbollah positions across Lebanon, including strikes against some 300 targets in the previous 24 hours.
In particular, IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi said on Monday that more than two dozen targets belonging to Hezbollah-linked financial firm al-Qard al-Hassan had been hit.
Al-Qard al-Hassan is a financial firm, officially registered as a charity, that has been offering customers credit in exchange for gold deposits on an interest-free basis since the 1980s. Israel charges that Hezbollah is making money from Lebanon civilians through AQAH.
The firm is used mainly by Moslem Shiite communities battling a years-long financial crisis that has locked Lebanese out of their bank deposits.
The United States has long sanctioned the association, accusing Hezbollah of using it as a cover to mask its financial activities and gain access to the international financial system.
Al-Qard al-Hassan says it has more than 30 branches nationwide, mainly in Hezbollah bastions including Beirut’s southern suburbs, but also in central Beirut and in other major cities such as Sidon and Tyre.
The attacks on northern Israel since October 2023 have resulted in the deaths of 29 civilians. In addition, 43 IDF soldiers and reservists have died in cross-border skirmishes and in the ensuing ground operation launched in southern Lebanon in late September.
Two soldiers have been killed in a drone attack from Iraq, and there have also been several attacks from Syria, without any injuries.
The IDF estimates that around 2,000 Hezbollah operatives have been killed in the conflict. Around 100 members of other terror groups, along with hundreds of civilians, have also been reported killed in Lebanon. 
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Posted by trailing wife 2024-10-22 00:00||
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File under: Hezbollah
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Posted by Grom the Reflective 2024-10-22 02:48||
2024-10-22 02:48||
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Posted by Skidmark 2024-10-22 10:19||
2024-10-22 10:19||
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Posted by Grom the Reflective 2024-10-22 18:05||
2024-10-22 18:05||
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