Iran cancels flights as Israel pounds Lebanon, kills dozens in Gaza

Maziar Motamediand Virginia Pietromarchi

October 6, 2024

 

• Israel’s army unleashes a new wave of attacks on the southern suburbs of Beirut, causing massive explosions with dozens of Lebanese killed and wounded over the past day.
  
• Iran’s Civil Aviation Organisation says flights across Iran will be cancelled until 6am local time (02:30 GMT) on Monday, according to state media.
• At least nine Palestinian children are among 17 killed after the Israeli military ordered civilians to immediately flee northern Gaza’s Jabalia refugee camp and began heavy bombardment.
• Israeli forces bomb a mosque in central Gaza, killing more than 20 Palestinians and wounding dozens more.
• In Gaza, at least 41,870 people have been killed and 97,166 wounded in Israeli attacks since October 2023. In Israel, at least 1,139 people were killed in the Hamas-led attacks on October 7 and more than 200 people taken captive.

 Iranian missiles 'overwhelmed' Israel's air defenses: Report

Satellite imagery shows that Iran’s barrage of ballistic missiles earlier this week was successful in overwhelming Israel’s air defenses despite causing only limited damage, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported on 6 October.

As a result, any future Iranian strikes against Israel “could have much more serious consequences if they target civilian infrastructure or heavily populated residential areas,” the WSJ concluded.

Iran fired at least 180 ballistic missiles at Israel on 1 October in response to a series of aggressions committed by Israel, including the assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran in July, Hezbollah secretary-general Hassan Nasrallah in September, and Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Quds Force commander Brigadier General Abbas Nilforoushan.

The Iranian attack on Israel did not lead to any fatalities but demonstrated Iran’s advanced missile capabilities and caused major damage to three Israeli airbases.

Israel is now reportedly preparing to launch a massive attack on Iran, possibly including strikes on its oil or nuclear infrastructure, with US assistance.

Tehran has, in turn, threatened to strike Israeli power plants and oil refineries if Israel moves forward with the attack.

The WSJ reports that, unlike an earlier attack in April, “when Iran fired a large number of slower cruise missiles and drones, Tuesday’s barrage was made up exclusively of some 180 much faster ballistic missiles, one of the largest such strikes in the history of warfare. Analysts say that most of these projectiles were Iran’s most modern ballistic missiles, the Fattah-1 and Kheibar Shekan.”

“The faster the missile, the harder it is to intercept it; that’s simple physics,” said Ulrich Kühn, head of research for arms control at the Institute for Peace Research and Security Policy in Hamburg, Germany. “It’s certainly much harder to defend against ballistic missiles, and even more so if there is a bulk of them coming in on a certain target because then you have the ability to overwhelm the antimissile defenses—which is exactly what happened in Israel.”

Satellite images of the Nevatim air base in southern Israel, home to its F-35 jet fighters, show that as many as 32 Iranian missiles successfully hit within the base’s perimeter, according to analysis by professor Jeffrey Lewis at the Middlebury Institute for International Studies.

“Thirty-two missiles is a lot of missiles,” Lewis said. “We have exaggerated ideas about the effectiveness of air defenses. We have this pop-culture idea that missile defenses are much more effective or available than they actually are.”

The Iranian armed forces’ general staff, meanwhile, has promised “widespread and comprehensive destruction” of infrastructure within Israel should Iranian territory be attacked. Adm. Ali Fadavi, deputy commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, has pledged to hit Israeli power stations, gas fields, and oil refineries, according to Iranian state media, the WSJ added.

 

Shooting operation kills one Israeli officer, injures several in Beersheba

One female Israeli officer was killed and ten people wounded, two of them critically, in a shooting operation at the central bus station in the city of Beersheba in southern Israel, Israeli media reported on 6 October.

The attacker was identified as Ahmed Saeed al-Uqbi, an Israeli citizen and resident of Hura, a Bedouin village in the Negev Desert.

Uqbi, who wore a bulletproof vest and was armed with a gun and a knife, opened fire at Beersheba's central bus station, authorities reported.

The Magen David Adom (MDA) ambulance service stated that he operated in three different locations before being shot and killed by police.

"We urge anyone in the area of the central bus station who doesn't need to be there to stay away until we conclude our sweeps and secure the area. If anyone spots a suspicious vehicle or individual, they should call 100," he added. "It's too early for conclusions; we are still in the midst of the incident," stated Israeli Police spokesperson Aryeh Doron.

Deputy Mayor of Beer Sheva, Shimon Tobol, claimed in an interview with Channel 14 that the attacker was aided by another resident of Hura to reach the scene and that the security forces are currently pursuing him.

When Beersheba (Bir al-Sabe') was occupied by the Israeli army in 1948 during the Nakba, Israeli troops carried out massacres and expelled 90 percent of the Palestinian population of the Negev, mainly to Jordan and Gaza.

Since 1948, Israel has built dozens of Jewish towns, villages, kibbutzim, and farms in the Negev while repeatedly demolishing Bedouin villages and pushing the remaining Bedouin into ever smaller enclaves.

Although Israel claimed that the Negev was just desert to justify confiscating land there, British aerial photos from 1945 show that all residential areas in the Beersheba district were farmed.

 

Hezbollah confronts invasion of Lebanon as Israel claims over 400 'terrorists' killed

Israeli troops are continuing their incursions into southern Lebanon and are taking heavy losses, as Tel Aviv claims to have killed hundreds of Hezbollah operatives since the start of its ground operation.

Hezbollah announced via its media page on 6 October that it carried out several operations against troops infiltrating south Lebanon and targeted Israeli positions along military sites facing the Lebanese border.

“While the Israeli enemy forces were trying to evacuate their wounded and dead soldiers in the Manara settlement at 12:45 a.m. on Sunday 10-6-2024, the Islamic Resistance fighters targeted them with a rocket salvo,” Hezbollah said, shortly after targeting soldiers in Manara with two separate rocket attacks and “hitting them accurately.”

“When a force of Israeli enemy soldiers attempted to infiltrate towards Khallet Shuaib in the town of Blida, the Islamic Resistance fighters targeted it at 12:10 noon on Sunday 10-6-2024 with artillery shells, forcing it to retreat and inflicting confirmed casualties on it,” the Lebanese resistance announced earlier, marking its first statement of the day.

Tel Aviv has admitted to the deaths of nine of its soldiers since the Israeli ground operation in Lebanon began on 2 October.

A Hezbollah field officer cited by the Lebanese resistance group’s media page on 5 October detailed an operation which, according to the officer, killed and injured 15 Israeli soldiers.

Hezbollah fighters opened fire at an “infiltrating force, which resulted in the explosion of mines that the enemy force had in its possession, with the aim of booby-trapping the municipality building. This resulted in the deaths and injuries of approximately 15 soldiers, and their screams and wails were heard clearly,” the officer said. The operation took place on Friday.

Numerous ambushes of a similar nature have been announced over the past few days as battles rage in south Lebanon, and as Israeli military censorship continues to obscure the rising number of casualties among the army’s ranks.

The field source added that since the Israeli ground operation began, Hezbollah has killed over 25 soldiers and officers and injured more than 130.

Israel’s Ziv Hospital in the city of Safad said on 5 October that it received 110 wounded in the past few days due to operations in south Lebanon and on the northern front.

The Israeli army said on Saturday that it has killed at least 440 Hezbollah operatives since the ground operation began.

It released footage via X that day showing its forces moving through what it said was a tunnel used by Hezbollah’s elite Radwan force. “250 meters of a terrorist tunnel in southern Lebanon” was “dismantled,” according to the Israeli army. “This tunnel was designated to be used in an invasion by Hezbollah’s Radwan Forces into Israel.”

Israeli army Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi said on Saturday that Israel “must continue exerting pressure on Hezbollah and creating additional and lasting damage to the enemy. Without relief and without allowing a respite for the organization.”

It is unclear whether the tunnel found by Israeli forces was recently in use, or if it is among the several inactive tunnels no longer needed by Hezbollah. The Israeli army launched an operation in December 2018 aimed at destroying Hezbollah tunnels along the border.

Late Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah ridiculed the operation in 2019. He said at the time that many of the tunnels predate the 2006 war.

The Israeli army released on 1 October images of its soldiers walking around in what it called Hezbollah tunnels.

“These pictures and videos are very old and have no relation to any current military operations at the Lebanese border,” Hezbollah said on Tuesday.

 

Israeli strike hits Beirut suburb after night of non-stop attacks

An Israeli airstrike targeted the southern suburb of Beirut on the morning of 6 October, coming after a night of violent and successive airstrikes across the area.

“The Israeli occupation launched an airstrike this morning, Sunday, targeting the area between Al-Laylaki and Al-Mreijeh in the southern suburb of Beirut,” Al Mayadeen’s correspondent reported.

Dozens of airstrikes targeted the Beirut suburb in the hours before.

Past midnight on Saturday and into the early morning hours, around 30 Israeli air raids targeted Mreijeh, the old Beirut airport road, Al-Laylaki, Tahwitat al-Ghadir, Burj al-Barajneh, and Haret Hreik.

Ghobeiry, Al-Hadath, the vicinity of Choueifat, Al-Amrousieh, and the areas between Al-Sfeir and Hay Madi were also hit.

A gas station and warehouses filled with medical and humanitarian supplies were hit, according to Al Mayadeen and Lebanon’s National News Agency (NNA). Oxygen tanks located in the targeted humanitarian warehouse exploded due to the attacks, creating loud sounds.

The attacks caused a temporary power outage in the eastern section of Beirut’s Rafic Hariri International Airport.

Massive bunker-buster bombs were reportedly used once again.

“The violent aerial bombardment was accompanied by the flight of enemy reconnaissance aircraft and drones in the skies of the capital Beirut and the suburb,” NNA reported.

Over 2,000 people have been killed, and more than one million internally and externally displaced as a result of Israel’s major escalation against Lebanon last month. The country’s south and east are under continuous bombardment, as well as the capital, with the attacks now reaching further north.

Israel struck and destroyed the main Lebanon-Syria border crossing on 4 October, where displaced people have been making their way across the border. A UN official said on 4 October that the nearly 900 available displacement shelters across Lebanon are full.

Over 32 medics have been killed by Israeli attacks across the country. A hundred children have been killed in the past eleven days, according to UNICEF.

 

Israeli troops bombard, besiege northern Gaza as 'generals' plan' unfolds

The Israeli military is carrying out a major military operation in Jabalia camp in Gaza as part of a broader operation to forcibly expel the remaining 300,000 Palestinians in northern Gaza to so-called humanitarian zones in the south of the enclave.

The Israeli military said troops from the 162nd Division’s 401st and 460th armored brigades encircled Jabalia camp overnight and were operating in the area “following intelligence on Hamas operatives and infrastructure, alongside efforts by the terror group to regroup there.”

The siege on Jabalia follows a night of heavy Israeli airstrikes and artillery shelling on northern and central Gaza, killing dozens, including a strike on a mosque sheltering displaced people in Deir al-Balah early Sunday that killed at least 19 people, Palestinian officials said.

The overnight bombing and shelling was likened by residents to the bombing carried out at the start of the war on Gaza.

Israel claimed the strikes targeted dozens of Hamas sites in Jabalia, including weapon depots, tunnels, cells of operatives, and other infrastructure.

“The operation will continue as long as necessary while systematically striking and thoroughly destroying the terror infrastructure in the area,” the Israeli military said.

The operation marked the fourth invasion of Jabalia by the army since the start of the war a year ago.

Amid the invasion and siege of Jabalia, the army issued evacuation orders to civilians from the entire north of Gaza, including Gaza City, telling them to flee south to the so-called humanitarian zone of Al-Muwasi near Khan Yunis.

The army demanded that Palestinians evacuate on the two main roads leading south, Salahuddin Street in the center of the strip and Rashid Road on the coast.

Some 300,000 Palestinians remain in Gaza’s north and have refused to obey multiple Israeli orders to abandon their homes in over a year of war.

Ministry of Interior and National Security in the Gaza Strip issued a statement Sunday telling Palestinians in north Gaza not to obey Israeli threats and to move to the nearest neighboring residential area until the danger has passed so they can return to their homes as soon as possible.

“We affirm the falsehood of the occupation’s claims regarding the existence of safe areas in the southern Gaza Strip, as all governorates of the Strip are under attack, and the occupation is committing crimes and massacres against citizens in all areas without exception, including the tents of the displaced,” the statement said.

Israel’s latest push to empty northern Gaza appears to be an effort to ethnically cleanse northern Gaza and starve anyone, including civilians and Hamas fighters, remaining by imposing a total siege on the area.

Itzik Zuarets, a journalist for Israel's state broadcaster Kan, said the so-called “Generals' plan” is now being carried out.

“Division 162 entered Jabaliya tonight and began operations to destroy the Hamas infrastructure being renewed there. In the future, the entire northern area of ​​the Gaza Strip will be cleansed according to the generals' plan - the entire population will be evacuated beyond the Netzer axis and the entire northern area of ​​the Gaza Strip will be declared a closed military area,” he wrote on the social media site X.

On 23 September, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that he was considering the “Generals’ Plan” to lay total siege to northern Gaza and expel all its Palestinian residents.

When retired major general Giora Eiland presented the plan one week before, he claimed it would “change the reality” on the ground in Gaza.

“We have to tell the residents of north Gaza that they have one week to evacuate the territory, which then becomes a military zone, [a zone] in which every figure is a target and, most importantly, no supplies enter this territory.”

The remaining civilians and Hamas fighters would then be forced to surrender or starve, according to the plan.

Eiland was the former director of the National Security Council and former head of the Planning Department of the Israel Defense Forces.

Israel’s religious settler movement seeks to empty northern Gaza of its residents and destroy their homes so that Jewish Israelis can establish settlements in their place.

In May, a coalition of Israeli settler groups enjoying government funding held a conference to discuss a “practical” plan to build the first Jewish settlements in Gaza.

Harey Zahav, an Israeli real estate firm notorious for constructing illegal settlements in the Occupied West Bank, unveiled a plan for building homes for Jewish settlers in Gaza. “A house on the beach is not a dream!” the firm’s advertisement stated.

Israel's genocide on Palestinians in Gaza since 7 October last year has killed 41,870 people, the majority women and children, according to the health ministry. Other estimates are much higher.