Iran launches salvo of ballistic missiles at Israel Tel Aviv starts ground incursion into South Lebanon

TEHRAN/BEIRUT: Iran fired a salvo of ballistic missiles at Israel on Tuesday in retaliation for Israel’s campaign against Tehran’s Hezbollah allies in Lebanon. Alarms sounded across Israel and explosions could be heard in Jerusalem and the Jordan River valley after Israelis piled into bomb shelters. Reporters on state television lay flat on the ground during live broadcasts. Foreign journalists saw missiles intercepted in the airspace of neighbouring Jordan. Israeli media reports said as many as 100 missiles had been launched. The firing of missiles came after Israel said its troops had launched ground raids into Lebanon, though it described the forays as limited. The Israeli campaign in Lebanon is the biggest escalation of regional warfare since fighting erupted in Gaza a... The raids by Israeli troops in southern Lebanon that began overnight were limited and went only a short distance over the border, an Israeli security official said on Tuesday, adding that no direct clashes with Hezbollah fighters were reported. The escalation caused alarm. The Israeli raids follow intense airstrikes that have devastated the Hezbollah’s leadership, including assassinating its chief Hassan Nasrallah in Beirut last week. Israel’s military said its ground raids are aimed at Hezbollah strongholds along the border that threaten Israel and is not a war against the Lebanese people. “Hezbollah turned Lebanese villages next to Israeli villages into military bases ready for an attack on Israel,” military spokesperson Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said. Residents in southern Lebanon fled on Monday and Tuesday as Israeli strikes drew nearer. At least 600 people were seeking refuge in a monastery on the southern Lebanon border on Tuesday after their Christian village of Ain Ebl received a warning from the Israeli military, local residents said. An Israeli military spokesman warned residents of Ain Ebl and at least 20 other towns to evacuate their homes immediately because the military would attack houses that armed group Hezbollah was using. The residents fled to the monastery in the town of Rmeish, which did not receive a warning, and were waiting for an army convoy to escort them to Beirut. A Hezbollah spokesperson said that the Israeli military had not entered Lebanese territory but that Hezbollah would be ready to fight them in direct clashes if they did. Hezbollah said in a statement on Tuesday that it had fired the “Fadi 4” at military positions in the suburbs of Israel commercial hub Tel Aviv.