Israeli strike kills three children, their grandmother in southern Lebanon

BEIRUT (Reuters): Three children and their grandmother were killed in an Israeli strike on a car in southern Lebanon on Sunday, a Hezbollah lawmaker from the area said, calling the attack “a dangerous development” that would have repercussions.

“The enemy will pay the price for its crimes against civilians,” lawmaker Hassan Fadlallah told Reuters. He said the children were aged between 8 and 14. Their mother had been wounded in the attack on the car as it was moving between the villages of Aynata and Aitaroun, he added.

Asked about earlier reports from security sources in Lebanon that an Israeli strike had killed three people in a car near Aynata, an Israeli army spokesperson said the army would be a releasing a statement later on Sunday about a strike in Lebanon.

Meanwhile, an Israeli was killed on Sunday in an attack by the Lebanese group Hezbollah over the border, Israel’s military said, as tensions have escalated between Israel and the militant group amid the war in Gaza.

Israel and the heavily armed, Iran-backed Hezbollah have been exchanging fire across the frontier since the Palestinian militant group Hamas and Israel went to war on October 7. It has marked the worst violence across the border since Israel and Hezbollah fought a war in 2006.