More than 20 injured in Israeli attack on Lebanon – Germany calls on citizens to leave

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More than 20 people were injured in an overnight Israeli attack on southern Lebanon. The German Foreign Ministry called on its citizens to leave the country in view of the deteriorating security situation.

The attack hit a residential building in the center of the city of Nabatieh. Seven people were injured in the attack, and 14 others were injured as a result of “panic, stress and suffocation,” the Lebanese state news agency reported. None of the injuries were described as serious.

Nabatieh is far from the border with Israel and has not been hit often since exchanges of fire between Hezbollah and the Israeli military began in October in response to Israel’s war on Gaza.

Israel did not initially disclose who its military was targeting. Ten civilians were killed in an Israeli attack on Nabatieh in February.

Germany, which sent a foreign ministry delegation to Beirut earlier this week, said in an updated travel warning that its citizens are “strongly advised to leave Lebanon.”

“The currently heightened tensions in the border area with Israel could escalate further at any time,” it said.

German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock, who also visited Israel, warned that any “miscalculation” could trigger a full-scale war between Israel and Hezbollah.

“With every rocket that crosses the Blue Line between Lebanon and Israel, the danger grows that a miscalculation could trigger open war,” she said.

“All those who bear responsibility must exercise the utmost restraint.”

Many countries have stepped up calls for their citizens to leave the country in recent days as hostilities between Israel and the Lebanese armed group and political party Hezbollah teeter on the brink of full-scale conflict.

Lebanese Health Minister Firas Abiad said on Wednesday that “the hospital sector is prepared for any emergency” if the situation escalates further.

During a visit to Washington, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said his country could send Lebanon “back to the Stone Age, but we don’t want that.”

“We don’t want war, but we are preparing for any scenario,” he said.

“Hezbollah is well aware that we can cause massive damage in Lebanon if war breaks out.”

His US counterpart Lloyd Austin told Mr Gallant that another war with Hezbollah could have “terrible consequences for the Middle East” and called for a diplomatic solution.

UN humanitarian coordinator Martin Griffiths told reporters in Geneva that Lebanon was “the crisis point of all crisis points.”

“This is unpredictable. It is potentially apocalyptic,” Griffiths said.

A war involving Lebanon “will drag Syria into it … it will drag others into it,” he said. “That is very worrying.”

The last full-scale war between Hezbollah and Israel took place in 2006.

Israel is threatening and preparing to invade southern Lebanon to restore security to displaced residents on the northern border. Tens of thousands have already been displaced on both sides of the border.

Iran-backed Hezbollah, which has also said it does not want war but would be ready for war if it were forced on Lebanon, will not stop its attacks until Israel stops bombing the Gaza Strip, where more than 37,700 Palestinians have been killed since October. The deaths came after Hamas launched an unprecedented incursion into southern Israel on October 7, killing about 1,200 people.

Updated: June 27, 2024, 10:04 a.m.