Israel cuts off main escape route from Lebanon into Syria

[HelenHen]

www.rte.ie/news/middle-east/2024/1004/1473520-middle-east-lebanon/

Israeli strikes have sealed off Lebanon's main border crossing with Syria, hours after an intense Israeli attack on Beirut's southern suburbs that is thought to have targeted the heir apparent to Hezbollah's slain secretary general.

The strikes added to fears inside Lebanon that Israel's targeting of Iran-backed Lebanese Hezbollah militants will bring an all-out conflict, with Israel also poised to respond to Tuesday's Iranian missile barrage on its territory.
Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said "the brilliant action of our armed forces a couple of nights ago was completely legal and legitimate", in a rare appearance leading Friday prayers in Tehran. He also urged Muslim nations from Afghanistan to Yemen join what he called defence against Israel.
US President Joe Biden said yesterday Israel's response could include a strike on Iran's oil facilities.

Lebanese Transport Minister Ali Hamieh told Reuters this morning's strike on the Syrian border hit inside Lebanese territory near the crossing, creating a four-metre-wide crater.
The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) had accused Hezbollah of using the crossing with Syria to transport military equipment into Lebanon.

"The IDF will not allow the smuggling of these weapons and will not hesitate to act if forced to do so, as it has done throughout this war," IDF spokesman Avichay Adraee said on social media.

According to Lebanese government statistics, more than 300,000 people - a vast majority of them Syrian - had crossed from Lebanon into Syria over the last 10 days to escape escalating Israeli bombardment.

The southern suburb of Dahiye, a stronghold of the Iran-backed Hezbollah, came under renewed strikes near midnight after Israel ordered people to leave their homes in some areas, residents and security sources said.

The air raids targeted Hezbollah official Hashem Safieddine, rumoured successor to its assassinated leader Hassan Nasrallah, in an underground bunker, Axios reporter Barak Ravid said on X, citing three Israeli officials.

Safieddine's fate was not clear, he said.

Thanks op. This is the comment from a Spanish journalist that is in Lebanon , there is a video in the link

Israel bombs the main route used by Lebanese fleeing the attacks to reach Syria. (The attack has left the two huge craters you see in the video.) Israel says this is to prevent Hezbollah from supplying weapons. People are still trying to get there on foot. Entire families. Lebanon's 900 shelters for displaced people are full.

https://x.com/almuariza/status/1842196173773295977

Same tactics as Gaza. It's much easier to kill people when they are stuck with nowhere to go sadly.

There is another video here. Apologies as she talks in Spanish but the damage done can be seen

https://x.com/almuariza/status/1842202110982566118

I was thinking how will aid enter Lebanon now ? If this was the main entry point hopefully there are some others so the only entry isn’t through Israel only

It's heartbreaking

I imagine it’s also to stop people entering the country through the Syrian border, like the Hezbollah fighters who work for the Assad regime and the IRCG who are helping Assad.

The airport is still open.

Yes if you'd read previous posts you would see that only those with financial means to charter a boat/ plane will be able to leave.

Yes that may well be he reason but it's irrelevant to innocent civilians who are trying to get out