A man was killed Thursday in an Israeli drone strike on southern Lebanon, the health ministry said, after Israel announced it was carrying out “special, targeted operations” against Hezbollah.
Despite a November truce that ended a war between Israel and Hezbollah, Israel has kept up its strikes on Lebanon, targeting the group’s sites and operatives but also occasionally members of their Palestinian ally Hamas.
“One man was killed and two others wounded in an Israeli enemy drone strike that targeted a motorcycle in the village of Mansouri”, near the coastal city of Tyre, the ministry said.
On Tuesday, a drone strike hit a car in a nearby village, killing one person.
Israel’s military claimed it had “eliminated” a Hezbollah member involved in developing the Iran-backed group’s artillery capabilities in the south.
Three others, including a Palestinian Hamas member allied with Hezbollah, were reportedly killed in a separate strike on northern Lebanon that same day.
On Wednesday, the Israeli military said its troops entered Lebanon to dismantle Hezbollah infrastructure near the Israeli border.
The 27 November ceasefire sought to end more than a year of hostilities with Hezbollah, including two months of all-out war that left the group severely weakened.
Under the ceasefire deal, Hezbollah was to pull its fighters back north of the Litani River, about 30 kilometres (20 miles) from the Israeli border, leaving the Lebanese army and United Nations peacekeepers as the only armed parties in the region.
Israel was required to fully withdraw its troops from the country, but has kept them in five places it deems strategic.
On Thursday, a patrol of the UN Interim Forces in Lebanon was blocked and pelted with stones by “several individuals in civilian clothes” in the southern village of Wadi Jilu, UNIFIL said.
“The LAF arrived at the scene and the situation was brought under control,” UNIFIL spokesman Andrea Tenenti said in a statement, referring to the Lebanese Armed Forces.
In recent weeks, several incidents have seen civilians in Hezbollah strongholds confront UNIFIL patrols. The mission is part of an international body tasked with monitoring the ceasefire agreement.
