Several journalists, including two from AFP, were injured Friday evening during a bombing near the village of Alma el-Chaab, in southern Lebanon, the target of Israeli shells according to Lebanese security sources.
Rockets fell on an area where there was a group of journalists from at least three different media, in the border village of Alma el-Chaab, according to an AFP journalist on site. Two Al-Jazeera journalists are also among the injured, according to the Qatari channel.
Earlier in the day, the Israeli army bombed the outskirts of several border towns in southern Lebanon, after an explosion on the barrier separating the two countries, according to security sources and an AFP correspondent.
A Lebanese security source reported an “infiltration attempt” from Lebanon. Exchanges of fire took place at the border after this attempt, according to al-Manar, the Lebanese Hezbollah channel.
The Israeli army, for its part, announced that it had carried out artillery fire on Lebanese territory after “an explosion on the border fence”.
Israeli bombings had already affected the outskirts of the villages of Dhayra and Aalma ech-Chaab, according to AFP correspondents on site.
At the beginning of the evening, Hezbollah indicated in a press release that it had responded “to Israeli attacks on Friday afternoon” by targeting “several Israeli positions”.
The border region has been the scene of regular clashes for almost a week, but operations have so far remained limited, as have Israeli bombardments on the outskirts of border villages in southern Lebanon.
The powerful pro-Iranian Hezbollah has so far been content with a measured intervention in the war triggered on October 7 by an attack launched by its ally, the Palestinian Hamas, against Israel, which has already left thousands dead in the two camps.
On Monday, the Shiite party said Israeli strikes had killed three of its members, while Palestinian fighters claimed responsibility for a foiled infiltration attempt.
The next day, the armed wing of the Islamist movement Hamas claimed responsibility for rocket fire from southern Lebanon, while Israel announced that it had targeted Hezbollah observation posts.
The “balance of terror” has prevailed since the 2006 war between Lebanon and Hezbollah, which left more than 1,200 dead on the Lebanese side, mostly civilians, and 160 on the Israeli side, mostly military.