Terrorists among hundreds killed in Lebanon, IDF says

Nearly 560 people died from Israeli airstrikes in southern Lebanon and more than 1,800 others suffered injuries, Lebanon’s Ministry of Public Health reported on Tuesday. Lebanon’s death toll included 50 children and 94 women, according to its health ministry. However, Israel Defense Forces spokesman Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said on Monday that Hezbollah militants accounted for a large portion of the casualties. Israeli airstrikes destroyed more than 1,300 locations where Hezbollah fighters were housing cruise missiles, drones, and rockets, the IDF explained. Israel, like the United States government, considers the Lebanese Hezbollah to be a terrorist organization.

So civilians were harmed in these airstrikes? Some of the locations Israel targeted included civilian residences where Hezbollah fighters were housing military equipment, Hagari acknowledged. He noted that the IDF warned civilians to evacuate those areas before conducting airstrikes. He accused Hezbollah militants of preventing many civilians from evacuating as the IDF told them to.

Hagari showed footage of what he said were secondary explosions following the initial blasts caused by some Israeli missiles. He argued that those secondary blasts came from ammunition stored in civilian homes by Hezbollah militants. Those secondary explosions may have caused some of the casualties, Hagari said. He called for the international community to condemn Hezbollah’s use of civilian homes for weapons storage.

Dig deeper: Read my report in The Sift about how Hezbollah presents a larger threat to Israel than Hamas.