Israeli strike kills 10 firefighters in southern Lebanon

BEIRUT

Ten firefighters were killed in an Israeli airstrike in southern Lebanon on Monday, the Lebanese Health Ministry said.

A ministry statement said the men lost their lives when an Israeli fighter jet hit a municipal building in the town of Baraachit.

The ministry called the attack a “war crime to be added to Israel’s criminal record against firefighters and ambulance workers in southern Lebanon.”

The attack came as Israel issued new evacuation orders for residents of 25 more border towns in southern Lebanon to leave their areas, taking the number of areas ordered evacuated to 100 in recent days.

Israel has been conducting relentless airstrikes since Sept. 23 on what it calls Hezbollah targets across Lebanon, killing more than 1,200 and injuring over 3,400 others.

The aerial campaign was an escalation in a yearlong conflict between Israel and Hezbollah since the start of Tel Aviv’s brutal offensive on the Gaza Strip that has killed nearly 42,000 victims, mostly women and children, since a Hamas attack in October of last year.

Due to Israeli attacks on Lebanon, at least 2,036 people have since been killed, over 9,500 injured, and 1.2 million others displaced, according to Lebanese authorities.

Despite international warnings that the Middle East region was on the brink of a regional war amid Israel’s relentless attacks on Gaza and Lebanon, Tel Aviv expanded the conflict by launching on Oct. 1 a ground invasion into southern Lebanon.

*Writing by Mohammad Sio in Istanbul