Benjamin Netanyahu says the Israeli military has killed “thousands of terrorists” in its operation against Hezbollah in Lebanon, leaving the Iran-backed militant group weaker than it has been in decades. Listen to a Daily episode on the Middle East crisis as you scroll.
Tuesday 8 October 2024 19:05, UK
The Lebanese health ministry says 36 people have been killed in Israeli attacks over the past 24 hours.
It says another 150 people have been injured.
This brings the total number of people killed in Lebanon since October 2023 to 2,119.
Meanwhile, the Lebanese disaster risk management unit says there have been 137 Israeli airstrikes in Lebanon in the past day.
It says most of these were in the south, southern Beirut and in the Bekaa Valley, east of Beirut.
Israel’s military says it has located and neutralised a Hezbollah tunnel that crossed ten metres into Israel from Lebanon.
The IDF said the tunnel was in “full operational control” until its fighters arrived in the area to prevent it from being used.
The tunnel started near the Lebanese town of Marwahin and emerged in the small border village of Zar’it in Israel, the report added.
Israeli troops and special units searched the tunnel and claimed to have found weapons, explosive devices and anti-tank missiles.
Benjamin Netanyahu is preparing the Israeli public for the likelihood of a “much longer” military operation in Lebanon, says our international correspondent John Sparks.
In the past hour, the Israeli prime minister shared a video message “to the people of Lebanon” where he told its citizens they had the power to free themselves from Hezbollah control.
“You have an opportunity to save Lebanon before it falls into the abyss of a long war that will lead to destruction and suffering like we see in Gaza. It doesn’t have to be that way.”
Sparks says he “serious doubts” whether the Lebanese people will be open to this message while Israel’s military continues its operation in the country, which has displaced more than 1.2 million people.
“What he’s doing in that speech, I think, is he’s preparing the Israeli public for the likelihood of a much longer military operation,” says Sparks.
Mr Netanyahu said Israel had “degraded” Hezbollah’s infrastructure and leadership, but Sparks says there’s a “contradiction here” as Hezbollah claims its capabilities are fine and its senior leaders have been replaced.
“The Israelis haven’t won yet and it’s going to be very difficult to stop these rockets and these missiles that Hezbollah fire into northern Israel,” adds Sparks.
“How long is that going to take? It’s very difficult. I think [Netanyahu] is addressing a core problem, which is the military operation is going to take time.”
Benjamin Netanyahu says Israel has taken out the would-be successors of Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah who was killed in a strike on Beirut less than two weeks ago, without naming them.
The Israeli prime minister shared a message in which he spoke “to the people of Lebanon”, urging them to “free yourselves from Hezbollah”.
He said Israel “has a right to defend itself” and that it has “degraded Hezbollah’s capabilities”.
“We took out thousands of terrorists, including Nasrallah himself, and Nasrallah’s replacement, and the replacement of his replacement,” Mr Netanyahu said.
It was not immediately clear who he meant, though Israel’s defence minister Yoav Gallant said earlier that Hashem Safieddine, Nasrallah’s cousin and his potential replacement, was “probably” killed in a strike last week.
Mr Netanyahu added: “Today, Hezbollah is weaker than it’s been for many, many years.
“Now you, the Lebanese people, stand at a significant crossroads. It is your choice. You can now take back your country and return it to a path of peace and prosperity.
“If you don’t Hezbollah will continue to try to fight Israel from densely populated areas at your expense. It doesn’t care if Israel is dragged into a wider war.”
Wet winter weather is likely to exacerbate the already poor conditions faced by displaced people in refugee camps in Gaza, the International Committee of the Red Cross has said.
According to the UN’s humanitarian agency, almost 90% of the people in Gaza have been displaced since the war started.
Speaking to Sky News from a refugee camp in Al-Mawasi in Gaza, Sarah Davies says people are living in “makeshift shelters” made up of “haphazard pieces of wood” nailed together with rugs and plastic sheeting.
“The coming months will be incredibly challenging for civilians,” she says.
“In winter we get very heavy rains. In Gaza there is a lot of flooding. The area where most of the population now lives has no type of essential infrastructure or drainage.
“I spoke to someone in a camp the other day who had experienced five minutes of rain, and the entire area had flooded.”
She says there are concerns that sewage and wastewater flooding could create more public health risks.
As we have been reporting, Lebanon’s capital Beirut has been the site of an intense Israeli bombing campaign in recent weeks.
The Israeli military has killed several senior Hezbollah figures, including its leader Hassan Nasrallah.
The attacks have largely focused on the southern suburb of Dahieh, though other areas have also been hit.
The city’s mayor, Abdallah Darwich, says there is now “no safe place” in Beirut because of Israel’s attacks.
“You do not know who is living in this building or that building, so you do not know if there is a target there,” he told the BBC.
“You can no longer say Beirut is safe. Where the next Israeli target is, nobody knows.”
He said that if a ceasefire can be achieved between Israel and Hezbollah then “Beirut will breathe out her stress”, but the city “will break” if no pause in fighting can be agreed.
“Give us peace in Beirut, and we can fix everything,” Mr Darwich added. “But we cannot live in this cycle of destruction.”
Lebanon has been “kidnapped by Hezbollah” but the government isn’t doing enough to distance itself from the group, says the country’s former prime minister.
Fouad Siniora was prime minster of Lebanon during the country’s last war with Israel in 2006, which lasted 34 days.
The war broke out when Hezbollah fighters crossed the border and attacked Israeli soldiers, killing three.
Mr Siniora made a public statement in the days that followed, distancing the Lebanese government from what had happened.
The country’s current leaders, he has said, have failed by not doing as his government did in 2006.
“This government did not do what my government did that day,” he told the BBC.
“My government was very clear and determined in stating that we were not aware, and we were not informed, of Hezbollah’s plan to cross the Blue Line on the border and to kidnap and kill Israeli soldiers.
“This time there hasn’t been any move made by the Lebanese government. The advantage of what we did is that we created a distance between the Lebanese government and Lebanon on the one hand, and Hezbollah on the other.”
He added that Lebanon is unable to elect a president because Hezbollah have been “insisting” they want one that will “stab that group in the back”.
For context: Lebanon has been without a properly functioning government since its last set of elections in 2022.
When President Michel Aoun’s term ended nearly two years ago, politicians couldn’t agree on his replacement – so the job remains empty.
Prime Minister Najib Mikati’s government remains in office in a caretaker capacity.
We’ve been reporting today about rocket attacks on Haifa, Israel’s third-biggest city, which is 80 miles (128km) south of the Lebanese border.
Hezbollah has been targeting the port city for two days.
The pictures below show damage caused by the strikes, with a man inspecting his house after a residential building in the Haifa Bay district was hit by a rocket.
By Professor Michael Clarke, military analyst
No matter what political or military changes we see in the Middle East by 7 October 2025, it will certainly be a more fragmented region.
No individual power will create more coherence than the current state of affairs.
This level of conflict won’t last at this level of intensity for another year.
If Israel can’t win a short war, it can’t fight a long one. Its economy is too small, and the leadership’s hubris may prove to be a danger.
The conflict will most likely resolve itself into a grumbling, open-ended war on three or four different fronts.
Read on here:
Israel’s defence minister Yoav Gallant says that the next potential Hezbollah leader was “probably” killed in a strike last week.
It was suggested that Hashem Safieddine could be the next leader of the group after its leader and his cousin Hassan Nasrallah was killed last month.
Reports suggested Safieddine was targeted by Israel in a strike on Beirut last Friday.
“Hezbollah is an organisation without a head. Nasrallah was eliminated, his replacement was probably also eliminated,” Mr Gallant told Israeli troops in a brief video distributed by the military.
“There’s no one to make decisions, no one to act.”
Hezbollah has not commented on Safieddine’s whereabouts since the strikes.
Be the first to get Breaking News
Install the Sky News app for free