Middle East crisis live: Israel launches fresh strikes on Beirut amid clashes with Hezbollah near Lebanese border | Israel

Hello and welcome to our continuing live coverage of the conflict in the Middle East. Here’s a recap of the latest developments.

Israel has launched fresh airstrikes on Beirut overnight, with a series of loud blasts and huge plumes of smoke reported in the south of the capital in the early hours of Saturday. The Israeli military had earlier demanded the evacuation of parts of Beirut’s southern suburbs.

The attacks, part of a wider assault that has driven more than 1.2 million Lebanese from their homes, followed intense bombardment on Thursday night that reportedly targeted Hashem Safieddine, the most likely candidate to replace Hassan Nasrallah as leader of Hezbollah. His fate remains unclear.

Separately, Hezbollah said it was engaged in ongoing clashes with Israeli soldiers near to Lebanon’s southern border, saying Israeli soldiers had renewed an attempt to advance towards the village of Adaysseh.

In other news:

• Media affiliated with Hamas reported on Saturday that a leader of the group’s armed wing was killed with three family members in an Israeli strike on a Palestinian refugee camp in the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli. It was named the al-Qassam Brigades leader as Saeed Atallah. Israel did not immediately comment on the strike.

• At least four hospitals in Lebanon announced the suspension of work amid the ongoing Israeli bombardment. Lebanon’s prime minister, Najib Mikatiurged the international community to pressure Israel “to allow rescue and relief teams to reach bombed sites and allow them to move” casualties.

• Israel cut off a key road near Lebanon’s Masnaa border crossing with Syria that has been used by hundreds of thousands of people to flee Israeli bombardments in recent days. Israel has accused Hezbollah of using border crossings with Syria to bring in weapons. More than 300,000 people – a vast majority of them Syrian – have crossed from Lebanon into Syria over the past 10 days to escape escalating Israeli bombardment, according to Lebanon’s government.

• More than 2,000 people have been killed in Lebanon in nearly a year of fighting between Israel and Hezbollahaccording to figures by the Lebanese government. Most have been killed in the past two weeks.

• Gaza’s health ministry said at least 41,802 people have been killed and 96,844 injured in Israeli military attacks on Gaza since last October in its latest update on Friday. The ministry has said thousands are most likely lost in the rubble.

• At least 29 Palestinians were killed in Israeli military strikes across the Gaza Strip on Friday, according to doctors. Israeli attacks continued across Gaza on Friday, including in the city of Deir al-Balah, where an Israeli strike on a home has killed at least four people, according to the Palestinian news agency Wafa. The military also launched bombs that ignited fires in homes in the Nuseirat refugee camp, while Israeli warplanes struck several sites in the southern city of Khan Younis, “resulting in further casualties and injuries,” Wafa reported.

• The northern regions of Israel were targeted by Hezbollah rockets almost continuously throughout Friday. The Israel Defense Forces said Hezbollah had launched about 100 rockets into Israel on Friday.

• Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, vowed that Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza would re-emerge strongly with new leaders. In a rare public sermon in front of tens of thousands in Tehran on Friday, Khamenei defended the “legal and legitimate” ballistic missile attack on Israel this week that Iran has said was in retaliation for the deaths of the Hezbollah secretary general, Hassan Nasrallah, and the Hamas political leader, Ismail Haniyeh.

• US president Joe Biden said he didn’t know whether Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was holding up a peace deal in the Middle East in order to influence the outcome of the 2024 US presidential election. He earlier urged Israel against striking Iran’s oil facilities.

• Israeli soldiers conducted widespread raids in the Hebron province in the occupied West Bank on Friday morning, resulting in the detention of more than 24 people, including “minors,” the Palestinian news agency reported. The majority of those detained were reportedly taken from the town of Beit Ummar. Human rights groups and international organizations have alleged widespread abuse of prisoners detained by Israel in raids in the occupied West Bank.

• Funerals were held on Friday for some of the 18 people killed in the occupied West Bank in an Israeli airstrike on a refugee camp in Tulkarm. Among the dead, according to Palestinian reports, was a family of four including two children. A spokesperson for the Palestinian Authority president, Mahmoud Abbas, described the attack as a “heinous crime” and a “massacre.” The attack was condemned by the UN rights office. Hamas‘armed wing, the to the–Qassam Brigades, confirmed that one of his commanders, Zahi Yaser Abd al-Razeq Oufi, and seven other fighters were killed in the Israeli strike.

• US forces carried out strikes on 15 targets in areas of Yemen controlled by the Houthi rebels on Friday, the US military confirmed. The media in Yemen reported a new round of airstrikes, including on the capital, Sana’a, and near the airport at the port of Hodeidah, and Israeli strikes continued in Gaza and Lebanon. The strikes were targeted at weapons systems, bases and other equipment belonging to the Iran-backed group, US officials said. The Guardian understands there was no UK involvement in the airstrikes on Friday.

• The last UK-government chartered flight for British nationals to leave Lebanon will depart from Beirut on Sunday. More than 250 British nationals have left Lebanon on flights chartered by government, the UK Foreign Office said on Friday. TO South Korean military transport aircraft evacuated 97 citizens and family members on Friday.