Israel attacks Beirut, Lebanon for the first time since ceasefire.

On Friday, March 28, Israel launched an attack on the Lebanese capital, Beirut. Prior to the attack, the Israeli military stated that two rockets had been launched from Lebanon towards Israel. This marked the first time since the ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hezbollah in November last year that the Israeli military had launched an attack on Beirut.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) stated that they “attacked a terrorist infrastructure site in the Dahieh area, which is a key terrorist hub of Hezbollah in Beirut used by the Hezbollah aerial unit (Unit 127) to store drones.”

Lebanese security sources told Reuters that the attack caused loud explosions in Beirut, accompanied by a large amount of black smoke. Before the attack, the Israeli military had issued evacuation orders for the area and carried out three smaller-scale drone attacks on buildings as a warning.

The IDF accused Hezbollah of “systematically embedding its terrorist infrastructure among Lebanese civilians, shamelessly using Lebanese civilians as human shields.”

The southern suburbs of Beirut, particularly Dahieh, serve as the stronghold of Hezbollah. Last year, the area was subjected to intense Israeli attacks, resulting in the deaths of several senior Hezbollah leaders, including Hassan Nasrallah who was killed in an airstrike in September the previous year.

On October 7, 2023, Hamas launched unprecedented attacks from Gaza against Israel, sparking the beginning of the conflict known as the Hamas-Israel war. Following this, Hezbollah began launching rockets, drones, and missiles towards Israel to support their ally Hamas. The conflict between Israel and Hezbollah escalated into a full-scale war in September last year, prompting Israel to launch massive airstrikes. The ceasefire agreement reached in November ended Israel’s intense bombing and ground military operations in Lebanon, as well as Hezbollah’s daily rocket attacks on Israel.

However, both sides have accused each other of failing to fully comply with the ceasefire agreement. Israel has claimed that Hezbollah still maintains military infrastructure in southern Lebanon. Lebanon and Hezbollah, on the other hand, allege that Israel is continuing airstrikes and positioning its forces at five locations near the border on the Lebanese side in an attempt to occupy Lebanese territory.

In the past week, two rockets launched from southern Lebanon towards Israel have violated the ceasefire agreement. On March 22, several rockets were fired into Israel, and on Friday morning, another set of rockets were launched towards Israel.

These recent events have reignited tensions in the region, casting a shadow over the fragile ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hezbollah, threatening to plunge the area back into conflict and instability.