By Rami Amichay
TIRA, Israel (Reuters) -Rockets fired from Lebanon wounded 11 people in central Israel on Saturday, Israeli emergency services said, after one of them hit a house, as prospects for a ceasefire dimmed.
Fighting has escalated between Israeli forces and the Lebanese Hezbollah group since September, and hopes that a U.S. push this week for a ceasefire have faded.
“We went out and saw dust, children screaming, women screaming and everyone went to the house that was struck,” said Qasim Mohab, a resident of Tira, where the rocket hit. “We were able to evacuate and rescue those who were inside the house, and thank God we were blessed that there was no one killed.”
Around the time the rockets hit, Hezbollah said it had targeted a military base on the outskirts of Tel Aviv.
Israel’s ambulance service said that 11 people were hurt by shrapnel. Air raid sirens continued to sound in northern Israel as rocket fire and drone attacks from Lebanon continued, the military said.
On Friday, Lebanon’s health ministry said 52 people were killed in Israeli strikes on more than a dozen towns in the Baalbek region, which has UNESCO-listed Roman ruins.
The Israeli military said on Saturday it had killed two Hezbollah commanders in the area of Tyre on Friday. There was no immediate comment from Hezbollah.
Iran-backed Hezbollah began firing rockets at Israel in support of its Palestinian ally Hamas a day after Hamas militants attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages back to Gaza, according to Israeli tallies.
More than 43,000 Palestinians have since been killed in Israel’s offensive in Gaza, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run enclave, and at least 2,897 people have been killed in Lebanon, its health ministry said on Friday.
Seventy-one people in Israel and Israeli-occupied territories have been killed by Hezbollah’s fire, according to Israeli authorities.
(Reporting by Rami Amichay in Tira, Maayan Lubell in Jerusalem and Menna Alaa El Din, Hatem Maher and Jaidaa Taha in Cairo; editing by Sandra Maler, Edmund Klamann and William Mallard)
