Israeli strikes kill 46 people in Gaza Strip and 33 in Lebanon, medics say

Israeli airstrikes killed at least 46 people in the Gaza Strip in the past 24 hours, including 11 at a makeshift cafeteria in an Israeli-declared humanitarian zone, medics said.

In Lebanon, warplanes struck Beirut’s southern suburbs and killed 33 people elsewhere in the country on Tuesday.

The latest bombardment came as the US said it would not reduce its military support for Israel after a deadline passed for allowing more humanitarian aid into Gaza.

The state department cited some progress, even as international aid groups said Israel had failed to meet the US demands.

In Lebanon, large explosions shook Beirut’s southern suburbs, an area known as Dahiyeh, where Hezbollah has a significant presence, soon after the Israeli military issued evacuation warnings for 11 houses there.

There was no immediate word on casualties. The Israeli military said it targeted Hezbollah infrastructure, including command centres and weapons production sites, without providing evidence.

Another Israeli strike on an apartment building east of Beirut killed at least six people.

Wael Murtada said the destroyed home belonged to his uncle and that those inside had fled from the Dahiyeh last month. He said three children were among the dead and other people were missing.

An Israeli airstrike on a residential building in central Lebanon killed 12 people and wounded eight, Lebanon’s health ministry said. The strike came without warning and state media said the building was sheltering displaced families.

Israel has been carrying out intensified bombardment of Lebanon since late September, vowing to cripple Hezbollah and put a stop to more than a year of cross-border fire by the Lebanese militant group.

A rocket smashed into a storage building in the northern Israeli town of Nahariya on Tuesday, killing two people, emergency workers said. Another two people were wounded by shrapnel in a separate impact outside the town.

A Hezbollah drone smashed into a nursery school near the northern Israeli city of Haifa on Tuesday, but the children were inside a bomb shelter and there were no injuries. The impact scattered debris across the playground.

At the same time, Israel has continued its campaign in Gaza, now more than 13 months old, triggered by Hamas’ October 7, 2023 attack into southern Israel.

An Israeli strike late Monday hit a makeshift cafeteria used by displaced people in Muwasi, the centre of a “humanitarian zone” that Israel’s military declared earlier in the war.

At least 11 people were killed, including two children, according to officials at Nasser Hospital, where the casualties were taken.

Video from the scene showed men pulling bloodied wounded from among tables and chairs set up in the sand in an enclosure made of corrugated metal sheets.

A strike on a house in the northern town of Beit Hanoun killed 15 people on Tuesday, including relatives of Al Jazeera journalist Hossam Shabat, who has been reporting from the north.

Mohamed Shabat and his wife Dima, both volunteer doctors at Kamal Adwan Hospital, were killed along with their daughter Eliaa, according to hospital director Hossam Abu Safiya.

Strikes in central and southern Gaza killed another 20 people, according to Palestinian medical officials.

The Israeli military had no immediate comment on the strikes.