Beirut bombed in worst strikes in decades as Israel-Iran war intensifies

Airstrikes in Beirut and Iranian missile attacks signal deepening regional conflict with mounting casualties and global energy disruption

Smoke rises from a building following an Israeli strike in central Beirut, Lebanon, Wednesday, March 18, 2026. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)

Israeli warplanes hit central Beirut in the early hours of Wednesday, destroying apartment buildings in some of the most intense airstrikes on the centre of the Lebanese capital for decades, an ​expansion of the US-Israeli war against Iran.

A day after Israel killed Iran's powerful security chief Ali Larijani in the highest-level assassination since the war's first day, Iran retaliated by ‌firing missiles with multiple warheads into Israel that Israeli authorities said killed two people near Tel Aviv.