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Beirut suburb attack: At least one killed in Israeli attack on Lebanon

Beirut suburb attack: At least one killed in Israeli attack on Lebanon
By Joseph Stepansky and Nils Adler
Published On 30 Jul 2024

This live page is now closed. You can continue to follow our coverage of the war in Gaza here.

30 Jul 2024 - 23:59
 (23:59 GMT)

Thanks for joining us

This live page is now closed.

You can read what we know so far about Israel’s strike on Beirut, Lebanon, here.

Read our explainer about the reports that Palestinians are being tortured in Israeli prisons,  here.

And you can always follow all our latest coverage of Israel’s war on Gaza, here.

30 Jul 2024 - 23:45
 (23:45 GMT)

Here’s what happened today

We will be wrapping up this live page shortly but before we do that, here’s a look at today’s events:

  • The Israeli army says it carried out a “precision strike” in southern Beirut, targeting a Hezbollah commander, Mushin Shukr.
  • Israel says Shukr was killed in the attack while Hezbollah sources say he survived.
  • Three civilians were killed and 74 wounded in the attack, Lebanon officials say.
  • In Gaza, the Civil Defence agency says 255 Palestinians were killed in a nine-day Israeli assault on the southern city of Khan Younis.
  • A dozen Palestinians have been killed in an Israeli military attack targeting the entrance of the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza.
  • The WHO said it has conducted the largest evacuation of wounded patients from Gaza, as the UN warns the enclave’s solid waste management system has collapsed.
  • Israeli forces have stormed the towns of Atara and Sinjil in Ramallah, in the occupied West Bank while setting up checkpoints in the Jaber, as-Salaymeh and Wadi al-Hassin neighbourhoods near the Ibrahimi Mosque.
30 Jul 2024 - 23:30
 (23:30 GMT)

WATCH: Survivor recalls family’s tragic deaths and ordeal amid Israeli strikes

30 Jul 2024 - 23:15
 (23:15 GMT)

Photos: The aftermath of Israel’s strike on Beirut

People gather near a destroyed building that was hit by an Israeli air strike in the southern suburbs of Beirut, Lebanon, Tuesday, July 30, 2024 [Hussein Malla/AP]
A wounded man is rushed to Bahman Hospital after the Israeli military struck Beirut’s southern suburb, on July 30, 2024 [AFP]
A woman injured in an Israeli military strike on a building in Beirut’s southern suburb on July 30, 2024, is escorted as she leaves Bahman Hospital [AFP]
Army soldiers stand guard near the site that was targeted by an Israeli strike, in the southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, 30 July 2024 [EPA-EFE/Wael Hamzeh]

30 Jul 2024 - 23:00
 (23:00 GMT)

‘There is no place out of reach for our forces’: Gallant

The Israeli defence minister has praised the military following the attack on southern Beirut.

“Tonight, we have shown that the blood of our people has a price and that there is no place out of reach for our forces to this end,” Gallant said.

Lebanese officials say at least three people were killed and 74 wounded in the attack.

30 Jul 2024 - 22:45
 (22:45 GMT)

Israel says it wants to end hostilities without ‘wider war’ but ready ‘for any scenario’

Israel’s military spokesman Daniel Hagari has issued a statement in which he says “Hezbollah’s ongoing aggression and brutal attacks are dragging the people of Lebanon and the entire Middle East into a wider escalation”.

“While we prefer to resolve hostilities without a wider war”, he said, the Israeli military “is fully prepared for any scenario”.

30 Jul 2024 - 22:30
 (22:30 GMT)
Opinion

Why are global health organisations not speaking up on genocide in Gaza?

By Eric Reinhart

It has been more than six months since the ICJ ruled that Israel was plausibly in violation of the Genocide Convention for its treatment of Palestinians.

Israel’s ongoing systematic attacks on Gaza’s health workers and infrastructure have played a central role in the court’s deliberations, putting the unfolding violence squarely within the domain of health scholars and institutions.

It is striking then that nearly all influential US-based global health organisations have ignored what may be the most acute and most preventable global health catastrophe in the world today.

From the gargantuan Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to the many smaller NGOs and academic centres that shape this field, these organisations have abstained from taking any meaningful stand against the systematic destruction of health infrastructure in Gaza actively enabled by the Biden administration’s provision of arms, funds and diplomatic cover for Israel.

Given such organisations’ extensive lobbying and collaborations with the US government, receipt of funding from it, and close relationships and substantial influence among many of its top officials, this silence is especially disappointing.

Read more here.

Palestinians inspect damage at al-Shifa Hospital after Israeli forces withdrew from the facility in Gaza City on April 1, 2024 [Dawoud Abu Alkas/Reuters]
30 Jul 2024 - 22:15
 (22:15 GMT)

Israeli forces raid Attar and Sinjil in occupied West Bank

Footage shared online and verified by Al Jazeera shows Israeli forces storming the towns of Atara and Sinjil in Ramallah, in the occupied West Bank.

Local sources said an Israeli military bulldozer stormed Atara, accompanied by military vehicles, on Tuesday evening.

30 Jul 2024 - 22:00
 (22:00 GMT)

UN’s Lebanon envoy ‘deeply concerned’ by Israeli strike on Beirut

The UN’s special coordinator for Lebanon has voiced concerns after the Israeli strike on Beirut which she said resulted in multiple civilian casualties.

UN Special Coordinator Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert “underscores once again that there is no such thing as a military solution to the ongoing conflict”, the envoy’s office said in a statement.

Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert [File:Hadi Mizban/AP]
30 Jul 2024 - 21:50
 (21:50 GMT)

Lebanon says three killed in Beirut strike

Lebanon’s Health Ministry says three people, including two children, have been killed and 74 wounded in the Israeli strike on Beirut’s southern suburbs.

The “non-final toll of the Israeli aggression on the southern suburbs of Beirut… is three martyrs, including a woman, a girl and a boy”.

The ministry added that “the search for missing persons under the rubble continues”.

A man inspects a destroyed building hit by an Israeli air strike in the southern suburbs of Beirut, Lebanon, Tuesday, July 30, 2024 [Hussein Malla/AP]
30 Jul 2024 - 21:40
 (21:40 GMT)
Houthi

Israeli military says it killed Shukr

In a statement, the Israeli military stated that it had killed Fuad Shukr in “a targeted intelligence-based elimination”.

It also claimed that Shukr was the head of Hezbollah’s strategic unit and Hezbollah leader Nasrallah’s “right-hand man” who was his “advisor for planning and directing wartime operations”.

The Israeli military added that he was the commander responsible for Saturday’s attack on Majdal Shams which killed a dozen people.

Hezbollah says that Shukr survived the attack and the group has denied responsibility for the attack on Majdal Shams.

30 Jul 2024 - 21:30
 (21:30 GMT)
Explainer

Who is Fuad Shukr?

Fuad Shukr, who Israel said was the target of the strike in southern Beirut, has been one of Hezbollah’s leading military figures since it was established more than four decades ago.

Shukr was a friend of the group’s late military commander Imad Mughniyeh, who was assassinated in Damascus in 2008, Hezbollah sources told the Reuters news agency.

The US says Shukr, believed to be in his 60s, played a central role in the 1983 bombing of the US Marine barracks in Beirut, which killed 241 US military personnel and put a bounty of up to $5m on his head.

Also known as Al-Hajj Mohsin, Hezbollah sources said Shukr is a special adviser to Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah and a member of the Shura Council, a decision-making body.

Sources said he became more prominent in Hezbollah after the assassination of Mughniyeh – a shadowy figure remembered in Hezbollah as a military mastermind who was on the US list of most wanted terrorists.

Hezbollah sources said Shukr fought Israeli troops during Israel’s 1982 invasion alongside  Mughniyeh and Mustafa Badreddine, another of Hezbollah’s veteran commanders who was killed in Syria in 2016.

30 Jul 2024 - 21:20
 (21:20 GMT)

Israel seals off neighbourhoods in Old City of Hebron

Israeli forces have set up checkpoints in the Jaber, as-Salaymeh and Wadi al-Hassin neighbourhoods near the Ibrahimi Mosque, the Wafa news agency reports, citing local activist Aref Jabar.

The military declared the areas closed military zones and banned the movement of Palestinians, according to the report.

The Ibrahimi Mosque has been a flash point in the past. In 1994, an Israeli settler opened fire on a group of Palestinians praying there, killing 29 people.

The mosque was subsequently divided, with a synagogue created at the location.

30 Jul 2024 - 21:10
 (21:10 GMT)

Satellite photos shows destruction of Tal as-Sultan reservoir

On Monday, the Israeli army admitted that its soldiers were responsible for the bombing of a reservoir in Tal as-Sultan, which provided drinking water for Palestinians in Rafah.

The UN Human Rights Office commented on the incident, saying that under international humanitarian law, it is “strictly prohibited” to attack infrastructure essential to the survival of the civilian population, including water supplies.

Rafah Mayor Ahmed al-Sufi called the attack “a crime against humanity”, saying the Israeli troops destroyed not only the tank but also a water well in the Tal as-Sultan neighbourhood, west of Rafah. The destruction exacerbated the water crisis in the southern city, he added.

The photos below show the well before and after the Israeli attack.

A combination picture shows a satellite image, top, of the Canada Well water facility in Tal as-Sultan, Rafah, before the site was damaged on July 18, 2024, and a satellite image of the same area, bottom, after the destruction, July 30, 2024 [Handout/Maxar Technologies/Reuters]
30 Jul 2024 - 21:00
 (21:00 GMT)

Kamala Harris says Israel has ‘right to defend itself’ after Beirut strike

Kamala Harris has commented on the Israeli strike south of Beirut, saying that “Israel has a right to defend itself”.

“I unequivocally support Israel’s right to remain secure and to defend the security of Israel,” Harris said as she travelled to Atlanta, Georgia for a campaign event.

“What we know, in particular, is it has the right to defend itself against the terrorist organisation, which is exactly what Hezbollah is,” she said.

“But all of that being said, we still must work on a diplomatic solution to end these attacks and we will continue to do that work.”

30 Jul 2024 - 20:50
 (20:50 GMT)
Analysis

Iran will not want to endanger Hezbollah

Rami Khouri, a non-resident senior fellow at the Arab Center Washington and a distinguished fellow at the American University of Beirut, spoke to Al Jazeera about where Iran fits into the attacks between Hezbollah and Israel.

He said Iran is “extremely close to Hezbollah” and has helped to develop its capabilities, making the group a key “link in the regional Axis of Resistance”.

The axis, he added, links “various Arab resistance militant groups with Iran and some other parties” who say they want “to try to push back against Israel-American hegemony”.

Hezbollah, he said, “is the most successful outcome of the Iranian Revolution outside of Iran”.

Khouri said that although that makes it very important to the Iranian regime, it is also “very careful not to endanger Hezbollah to keep it strong”. Iran doesn’t “want to be reckless” by pushing the Lebanese armed group into a “big war”, he said.

“It’s a likelihood is that there will be continued tit-for-tat counter attacks” between Israel and Hezbollah and “it’s absolutely sure that Hezbollah will carry out some kind of operation of equal magnitude to what the Israelis did”.

“Maybe they’ll attack a building in the suburbs of Tel Aviv to show their reach, or maybe they’ll attack a military base, and they might attack they target a particular person,” Khouri said.

30 Jul 2024 - 20:40
 (20:40 GMT)

If you’re just joining us

Here are the latest updates:

  • An Israeli strike in southern Beirut that killed at least one person has been condemned by Lebanese officials and raised the prospect of further escalation after months of cross-border fighting.
  • It remained unclear if Israel’s reported target, Hezbollah commander Mushin Shukr, was injured or killed in the strike.
  • In Gaza, the civil defence agency has said 255 Palestinians were killed in a nine-day Israeli assault on the southern city of Khan Younis, as attacks have continued across the enclave.
  • The World Health Organization (WHO) has said it has conducted the largest evacuation of wounded patients from Gaza, as the United Nations warns the enclave’s solid waste management system has collapsed.
30 Jul 2024 - 20:30
 (20:30 GMT)

Wounded patients evacuated from Gaza to Abu Dhabi: WHO

The World Health Organization (WHO) says on X that the 85 wounded patients were evacuated for specialised medical care.

30 Jul 2024 - 20:20
 (20:20 GMT)

US was offering $5m for info on target of Israeli strike

The US State Department had been offering $5m for information on Muhsin Shukr, also known as Fuad Shukr, prior to Israel’s attack today.

Hezbollah sources say Shukr survived the attack, although his fate remains unclear.

The US, in a listing explaining the reward, described Shukr as a senior advisor on military affairs to Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah.

It also said he “played a central role” in the 1983 bombing of a US Marine Corps barracks in Beirut that killed 241 US soldiers.

30 Jul 2024 - 20:10
 (20:10 GMT)

State media in Lebanon: One killed in Israeli strike on Beirut

Lebanon’s National News Agency (NNA) says that a female civilian was killed when Israel bombed a building in Haret Hreik, in the southern suburbs of the Lebanese capital.

“Sixty-eight civilians were injured, five of whom were critically injured, while the rest suffered moderate to minor injuries. Most of them were treated in emergency departments and were discharged from hospitals,” the NNA added.

The hospitals that treated the patients were named as “Bahman Hospital, Al-Sahel Hospital, Al-Rasoul Al-Aazam Hospital, Al-Zahraa Hospital, Al-Jeitaoui University Hospital”.