Israeli strike kills 53 north of Beirut, including 7 children
An Israeli strike in Lebanon killed 53 people on November 10th, including seven children, reported the Asharq Al-Awsat.
According to Lebanon’s health ministry, the ordinance hit the village of Almat, north of the capital Beirut.
AFPTV footage showed rescuers rummaging with their bare hands through the wreckage of a house that had been completely razed.
They pulled out bodies wrapped in blankets while an excavator moved the rubble.
Almat is about 30 kilometers (19 miles) from Beirut, located in the mostly Christian Jbeil region.
While the village has a Shiite Muslim majority, its position is much further north than Hezbollah’s traditional strongholds south of Beirut, which have been heavily targeted.
The health ministry also said body parts had been recovered from the site and were being identified.
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Hezbollah lawmaker Raed Berro was at the site of the strike and denied Israeli claims that Hezbollah members or weapons were embedded among civilians.
He told the AFP: “Important military and security figures are usually on the frontlines, not at the rear.”
“Under the rubble, there are only children, elderly men and women.”
Facebook user Ali Haydar posted a picture of the home, which he said belonged to his family, before it was destroyed.
In his post he said that people displaced from the eastern Baalbek region had sought refuge there.
He said: “There were 35 relatives of ours from Baalbek in the house.”
“Most of them have been martyred.”
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Following the strikes, dozens of people packed their belongings in their cars and fled the village, an AFP correspondent said.
The health ministry also said Israeli strikes killed three Hezbollah-affiliated rescuers in south Lebanon.
The attack comes after Lebanese state media said on November 8th that Israel detonated explosives planted inside houses in three border villages, according to Levantis.me
The official National News Agency said: “Since this morning, the Israeli enemy’s army has been carrying out bombing operations inside the villages of Yaroun, Aitaroun and Maroun Al-Ras in the Bint Jbeil area, with the aim of destroying residential homes there.”
All three villages had already been battered by the war that has engulfed Lebanon for more than a year.
Israel intensified attacks in September and launched an invasion of the country in October.
Asharq Al-Awsat, Levantis.me and Agencies
