Middle East tensions: Hezbollah claims it has fired 200 rockets into Israel in one of largest barrages yet
4 July 2024, 09:24 | Updated: 4 July 2024, 14:06
Militant group Hezbollah has said it has fired 200 rockets into Israel in one of its largest barrages yet.
The Iran-backed organisation claimed it launched the attack on 10 Israeli military sites using a "squadron of drones".
Tensions have been boiling around the border between Israel and Lebanon in recent weeks.
The Israeli military said "numerous projectiles and suspicious aerial targets" had entered its territory, many of which it said were intercepted.
Israel's ambulance service said there were no casualties reported.
The barrage of rockets is believed to be in retaliation for a strike that killed one of Hezbollah's senior commanders.
Read more: Furious fighting between Israel and Lebanon is ratcheting up risk of all-out war
Israel's military acknowledged on Wednesday it had killed Mohammad Naameh Nasser, who headed one of Hezbollah's three regional divisions in southern Lebanon, a day earlier.
Mr Nasser, killed by an airstrike near the coastal city of Tyre in southern Lebanon, was one of the most senior Hezbollah commanders to die in the conflict.
Hours after Israel's acknowledgement of his death, Hezbollah launched scores of Katyusha and Falaq rockets with heavy warheads into northern Israel and the occupied Syrian Golan Heights.
The US and France are continuing to scramble to prevent the skirmishes from spiralling into an all-out war, which they fear could spillover across the region.
Tensions between Israel and Lebanon erupted shortly after the outbreak of the war in Gaza. Hezbollah says it is striking Israel in solidarity with Hamas, another Iran-allied group.
The fighting has displaced tens of thousands of people on both sides of the border.
In northern Israel, 16 soldiers and 11 civilians have been killed.
In Lebanon, more than 450 people - mostly fighters but also dozens of civilians - have been killed.
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Today's strike comes as Israel's cabinet is set to reconvene to discuss Hamas's latest response to a US-backed proposal for a phased ceasefire in Gaza.
The US has rallied world support behind the plan that would see the release of all of the hostages still held by the militant group in return for a lasting truce and the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza.
But until now, neither side appears to have fully embraced it.
(c) Sky News 2024: Middle East tensions: Hezbollah claims it has fired 200 rockets into Israel in one of largest barrages yet
