Israel targets Hezbollah commander in strike on Beirut suburb

Photos of the 12 children and teenagers killed in a rocket strike at a soccer field, and chairs with their names are seen displayed on a roundabout in the village of Majdal Shams, in the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights (Leo Correa/AP)

The Israeli military said it carried out a strike on Beirut targeting the militant commander allegedly behind the deaths of 12 children and teenagers in a rocket attack on the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights over the weekend.

Israel has blamed the rocket attack on the Hezbollah militant group, which has denied any role in the attack.

A Hezbollah official and the group’s TV station said that an Israeli airstrike hit Hezbollah’s stronghold south of Beirut on Tuesday evening, causing damage.

People wait at Rafik Hariri International Airport in Lebanon as fears of an escalation in the conflict between Hezbollah and Israel prompted some airlines to cancel flights (AP)

The airstrike on Beirut’s southern suburb of Haret Hreik damaged several buildings, but it was not immediately clear if any Hezbollah official was targeted, the Hezbollah official said on condition of anonymity in line with regulations.

Meanwhile, a senior United Nations official has appealed for the reopening of land crossings into the Gaza Strip and removing crippling restrictions on the delivery of aid to avert a humanitarian catastrophe in the war-torn Palestinian enclave.

Corinne Fleischer, regional director of the World Food Programme, said her agency has become unable to provide food rations in the strip since it does not have enough food inside Gaza.

“Right now the biggest challenge is we don’t have enough crossing points to bring the food in,” she told The Associated Press in Cairo.

“We need road access. We need the Rafah (crossing) to open again. We need Kerem Shalom to work better. We need law and order.”

The Rafah crossing, which had been the main entry point for humanitarian aid, was closed early in May after Israel’s military took over the crossing’s Palestinian side as part of its ground assault on Gaza’s southernmost city of Rafah.