The Lebanese health ministry reports 394 killed, including 83 children, as Israeli strikes intensify and target central Beirut.
BEIRUT: The Lebanese health ministry announced on Sunday that the death toll from Israeli strikes over the past week has risen to 394 people, including 83 children and 42 women.
Health Minister Rakan Nassereddine provided the updated figures at a press conference, stating that nine rescue workers were among the dead and condemning attacks on medical teams and ambulances.
“These are civilians being targeted, not, as they claim, military personnel and military installations,” Nassereddine said, adding that “the pace of the massacres has increased in the past 48 hours”.
The minister’s previous toll, announced on Saturday, had put the number of dead at 294.
The latest escalation began on Monday when the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah attacked Israel in response to the killing of Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei at the outset of a US-Israeli campaign against the Islamic republic.
Since then, Israel has launched multiple waves of strikes across Lebanon and sent ground troops into border areas, with the conflict marking a significant expansion of the ongoing Middle East war.
Early Sunday, the Lebanese health ministry said an Israeli air strike hit a hotel room in Beirut’s city centre, killing four people and wounding 10 others.
Israel’s military said it had “conducted a precise strike targeting key commanders” in the Iranian Revolutionary Guards’ Quds Force, which is its foreign operations arm.
In the southern town of Ghazieh, an Israeli attack flattened a building, with rescuers seen searching through the debris amidst destroyed solar panels.
The health ministry also reported that at least 11 people were killed in Israeli morning strikes on the village of Sir al-Gharbiyeh, with the toll including children and people still trapped under rubble.
Standing next to a destroyed home in Sir al-Gharbiyeh, resident Ali Youssef Taha told AFP that “a family was sleeping inside” before “Israeli warplanes bombed the building, resulting in a massacre”.
Mayor Saadallah Mohammed Maatouk said around 500 families were staying in the town but vowed that “what happened will not deter us, and we remain steadfast”.
On Sunday, the Israeli military reiterated its call for residents south of Lebanon’s Litani river, approximately 30 kilometres north of the Israeli border, to flee the area.
The Israeli military also confirmed on Sunday that two of its soldiers were killed in combat in southern Lebanon, marking the first deaths of its troops since the latest offensive began on March 2.
