Hezbollah says fires rocket salvo at northern Israel

BEIRUT: Hezbollah said it fired rockets at northern Israel, including at a military base near the city of Haifa on Saturday after the Israeli army reported a barrage of projectiles launched from Lebanon.

The “large salvo” of advanced rockets hit a military base east of Haifa, said Hezbollah, which has vowed to intensify attacks on Israel weeks into an all-out war that erupted on September 23.

In an earlier statement, the Iran-backed group said it targeted a region north of Haifa city with a rocket salvo.

Five people were injured in Kiryat Ata, in the Haifa district, mostly from shrapnel injuries, said a spokesperson for emergency service provider Magen David Adom.

A rocket damaged a three-storey building and burned two cars in Kiryat Ata, with firefighting teams and ambulances dispatched to the area, AFP footage showed.

The Haifa attacks came as Israel said a drone targeted Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s residence in the central Israeli town of Caesarea on Saturday.

Netanyahu’s office said the Israeli premier and his wife were not in Caesarea during the drone attack and “there were no injuries”.

Throughout the morning, sirens blared in Israel as Lebanese resistance group Hezbollah launched projectiles from various locations.

The group on Thursday said it was opening a new “escalatory phase” in its war with Israel.

Late last month, Israel dramatically stepped up its air strikes on Lebanon and sent in ground forces after nearly a year of cross-border exchanges.

Lebanon’s health ministry said two people were killed on Saturday in an Israeli strike on a vital highway north of Beirut, in the first attack on the area since Hezbollah and Israel started trading fire last year.

Since late September, the war has left at least 1,418 people dead in Lebanon, according to an AFP tally of Lebanese health ministry figures, though the real toll is likely higher.