BAALBEK, Lebanon — Rescue efforts continued Friday in Baalbek after an Israeli airstrike destroyed a civil defense center, killing 12 people, according to Baalbek’s governor.
The attack on Thursday also wounded several others and marked another escalation in Israel’s ongoing strikes across Lebanon. Separately, Lebanon’s health ministry reported that eight people, including five women, were killed and 27 others wounded in an Israeli attack on the city of Baalbek earlier the same day.
In Beirut, rubble and debris filled the streets near Tayouneh junction, one of the capital’s busiest traffic areas, after an Israeli airstrike on Friday morning flattened a building. Smoke billowed into the air as Lebanese civil defense workers and onlookers gathered at the scene.
The Tayouneh strike, in a district where Hezbollah-controlled southern suburbs meet other parts of the city, marked a rare hit on a more central urban target. It was one of several airstrikes Israel launched Friday morning amid a sharp escalation in its campaign against Hezbollah-controlled areas in southern Lebanon.
The intensified airstrikes coincide with U.S.-led diplomatic efforts aimed at ending the broader conflict. Israel has ramped up its offensive in Lebanon as tensions between Hezbollah and Israel continue to rise, paralleling the ongoing war in Gaza.
