Israeli strikes on Beirut and southern Lebanon killed at least 23 people early Sunday, including four killed and 10 wounded in a strike on the Ramada Hotel in Beirut’s Raouche district.
The strike hit a seafront hotel in an area sheltering civilians displaced by the fighting, while Israel said it had targeted Iranian Revolutionary Guard figures in Lebanon, underscoring a widening conflict that has reached civilian sites in Beirut.
Lebanon’s National News Agency said the toll was likely to rise as civil defense and ambulance crews continued clearing rubble and recovering bodies. It said 19 people were killed in a three-story building in Nabatieh in southern Lebanon that the Israeli army struck late Saturday.
The Israeli army justified the hotel attack in an Arabic-language statement, saying the strike was “precisely targeted,” and claimed it had hit leaders in Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps operating in Lebanon, specifically the Lebanon Corps, which it accused of planning attacks against Israel.
The statement said the room targeted in the hotel was being used by senior Iranian officials, including intelligence operatives and financial officials linked to the Quds Force, but did not name them.
The hotel is in an area with dozens of seafront hotels housing civilians displaced from southern Lebanon and Beirut’s southern suburbs by the continuing bombardment.
Lebanese websites published live images showing damage to a fourth-floor room and shattered windows, while security forces sealed off the hotel and some guests fled in panic.
The strike was the second Israeli attack on a hotel this week. A similar strike on Wednesday hit a hotel in Hazmieh, a predominantly Christian area near Beirut adjacent to Baabda, where the presidential palace, ministries, and diplomatic missions are based.
In response, Hezbollah targeted several Israeli settlements and sites in 20 attacks using rockets and drones, including Nahariya, the Tel Hashomer military base, Haifa Naval base, Stella Maris maritime surveillance site, defense technology company ELTA Systems, and the Northern Command headquarters at Dado base.
Hezbollah also warned residents of the settlements of Nahariya and Kiryat Shmona to evacuate immediately and head south before attacking them with rocket barrages and swarms of drones.
The renewed fighting in Lebanon comes after Hezbollah entered the US-Israeli war against Iran last Sunday, backing Tehran and avenging the killing of Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.
