Emmanuel Macron spoke out on Saturday October 5 in favor of stopping deliveries of weapons used by Israel in the Gaza Strip. “I think that today, the priority is that we return to a political solution, that we stop delivering weapons to carry out the fighting in Gaza”he declared on France Inter. “France does not deliver any”he added, while the government had clarified in January that it only exported defensive equipment to the Jewish state. Follow our live stream.
Canada calls on its nationals to leave Lebanon. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Saturday called on his compatriots to urgently leave Lebanon, bombed by the Israeli army, which launched a ground operation against Hezbollah in the south of the country. “We encourage all Canadians who are in Lebanon to take seats on these planes and get out of Lebanon while they can”he declared during a press briefing in Paris, where he is participating in the Francophonie summit. In recent days, Australia, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and even Germany have launched similar appeals, and even started to evacuate their nationals. France has not yet issued such an opinion.
A mosque targeted in southern Lebanon. The Israeli army said it struck Hezbollah fighters overnight from Friday to Saturday inside a mosque in Bint Jbeil, southern Lebanon. “The Air Force struck Hezbollah terrorists who were operating in a command center located inside a mosque adjacent to Salah Ghandour Hospital in southern Lebanon”the IDF said on Telegram, adding that residents of the area had been alerted. This is the first bombing of this type since the start, in October 2023, of cross-border exchanges of fire between the Islamist movement and Israeli forces.
Iran taught Israel a “lesson”, according to Bashar al-Assad. The Syrian president said on Saturday that Iran had given a “lesson” to Israel by launching a missile attack on that country on Tuesday, according to a statement from his office. The firing of some 200 missiles on Israel by Tehran was “a strong response” against “the Zionist entity”said Bashar al-Assad during an interview with the head of Iranian diplomacy, Abbas Aragchi, visiting Damascus.
Fighting around the Lebanon-Israel border. Hezbollah reported fighting against Israeli troops in this area early Saturday morning. The supreme leader of Iran, Ali Khamenei, had warned the day before that his allies, mainly the Lebanese Hezbollah and the Palestinian Hamas, would continue the fighting against the Jewish state. On alert in the face of Israeli operations, Hezbollah also says it has targeted troops in the Yarun region, in southern Lebanon, with a “rocket salvo”as well as soldiers on the Israeli side.
New bombings reported in Beirut. A series of explosions were heard overnight from Friday to Saturday in the southern suburbs of the Lebanese capital, known to be the stronghold of Hezbollah, after the Israeli army issued evacuation orders for certain areas. Friday evening, the spokesperson for the Israeli army in Arabic, Avishay Adrae, had indeed alert residents of neighborhoods Burj el-Barajneh and Haret Hreik of imminent operations on “Hezbollah facilities and interests”ordering these residents to stay away “at least 500 meters” designated sites.