Israel vowed to respond with force to all Hezbollah attacks after the Iran-backed Lebanese militant group fired a barrage of rockets across the border today for the second consecutive day. “Israel will respond with force to all Hezbollah aggression,” government spokesman David Mencer said at a news conference, adding that “through diplomatic efforts or otherwise, Israel will restore security on our northern border.”
The changes that Hamas has requested to the ceasefire proposal presented by the US are “not significant” and include the complete withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza: a senior member of the group told Reuters. Hamas, he said, had asked for a list of 100 Palestinians with long sentences to be released from Israeli prisons, adding that the Israeli document had excluded the request and limited releases to only prisoners with remaining sentences of less than 15 years. “There are no significant amendments that, according to the Hamas leadership, justify objections,” the source said.
The Israeli Air Force “hit and dismantled (yesterday, ed.) over 45 terrorist targets throughout the Gaza Strip, including military facilities, armed terrorist cells, rocket launchers, tunnels and further terrorist infrastructure”: the IDF reports this in a statement . Also yesterday, the note continues, Israeli forces eliminated more than 10 terrorists in the central Gaza Strip, including one who had participated in the October 7 attack in southern Israel.
US, ‘de-escalation needed on Israel’s northern border’
The United States has urged a “de-escalation” along Israel’s northern border after Hezbollah fired more than 200 rockets in response to the killing of a senior commander of the group by Israeli forces. Pentagon deputy spokeswoman Sabrina Singh said this yesterday in a briefing. Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and his US counterpart Lloyd Austin had a telephone conversation on Tuesday, Singh said. “We’re seeing an increase in activity in the north, and we don’t want things to escalate into a larger regional conflict, and that’s not new,” the spokeswoman said. “It’s something we’ve said from the beginning, since Hamas launched its brutal attack on October 7. We never want to see an escalation of tensions in the region and we have taken very specific measures from the beginning, with the decision of the Secretary (Austin, ed.) and, of course, with the President, to bring Ford into the Eastern Mediterranean. We will continue to push for de-escalation.” Austin, he concluded, “talked about this at length yesterday (Tuesday 11th) with Mr. Gallant. I won’t go into the details of the phone call, but we don’t want to see a broader regional conflict, and that’s why we want to see a de-escalation of tensions in the region”.
Hamas, the death toll in Gaza has risen to 37,232
The death toll in Gaza since the start of the war has risen to 37,232, while the wounded are 85,037. The Hamas Ministry of Health announced this by updating the death toll and underlining that 30 deaths have been recorded in the last 24 hours alone.
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