Iran-US war ceasefire teeters as Israeli strikes kill 250 in Lebanon; Hezbollah chief’s nephew dead
In Beirut, Israel claimed it had killed Ali Yusuf Harshi, identified as a secretary and nephew of Hezbollah leader Naim Kassem, in Wednesday's airstrikes on the capital.
The fragile two-week ceasefire between Iran, Israel and the United States is facing uncertainties on Thursday, April 9, as Israel pressed on with a punishing air campaign against Hezbollah in Lebanon, drawing sharp international reactions and rocket fire in return.
Israeli attacks have killed at least 254 people and wounded 1,165 others, Al Jazeera reported, citing Lebanon’s Civil Defence, on Wednesday alone accounting for the deadliest single day of the latest Israel-Hezbollah war.
A fresh strike on the southern village of Abbasiyeh early Thursday killed at least seven more people and wounded others, news agency Associated Press reported. The Israeli military did not immediately acknowledge the Abbasiyeh strike.
In Beirut, Israel claimed it had killed Ali Yusuf Harshi, identified as a secretary and nephew of Hezbollah leader Naim Kassem, in Wednesday’s airstrikes on the capital. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in a post on X, said, “We continue to strike Hezbollah with force, precision, and determination. In Beirut, we eliminated Ali Youssef Kharshi, the personal secretary of Hezbollah terror organization Secretary-General Naim Qassem and one of the people closest to him.” He added that overnight the IDF had hit “crossings used to transfer thousands of weapons, rockets, and launchers, as well as weapons depots, launchers, and Hezbollah headquarters,” vowing: “Whoever acts against Israeli civilians—will be struck.”
Hezbollah did not immediately respond to the claim about Harshi, but sirens sounded in northern Israel early Thursday as the group claimed a rocket barrage across the border.
Two-week Iran-US ceasefire announced Truce
Pakistan PM Shehbaz Sharif announces an "immediate ceasefire everywhere including Lebanon" after mediating the US-Iran deal. Celebrations erupt in Tehran and Beirut's southern suburbs.
Netanyahu: Truce does NOT cover Lebanon Fracture
The Israeli PM publicly contradicts the mediator, saying Israel has "finger on the trigger" and will keep striking Hezbollah. The first cracks in the deal appear within minutes of the announcement.
Israel issues mass evacuation orders Warning
IDF orders civilians out of a 40-km zone from the border and reissues warnings for Beirut's southern suburbs. Residents of Tyre are told to flee specific buildings — a prelude to the largest strike of the war.
100+ strikes in 10 minutes — largest blow since 'Operation Beepers' Strike
Israel unleashes its largest coordinated assault of the war — hitting central Beirut (Corniche al-Mazraa), the Bekaa Valley, Sidon, Mount Lebanon and southern villages. Busy commercial areas struck without warning. Defence Minister Katz calls it the heaviest blow to Hezbollah since the 2024 pager attack.
Lebanon toll: 254 killed, 1,165 wounded Massacre
Lebanese Civil Defence confirms the deadliest single day of the Israel-Hezbollah war. President Joseph Aoun calls it a "massacre"; UN rights chief Volker Türk calls the scale "nothing short of horrific."
Iran closes the Strait of Hormuz — again Retaliation
Tehran announces re-closure of the strait — through which 20% of global oil flows — in direct response to the Lebanon strikes. The White House calls it "completely unacceptable" and demands it be reopened.
IRGC warning: Stop, or we hit back Live
Iran's Revolutionary Guards issue a final warning: "If aggression against Lebanon does not cease immediately, we will deliver a response." FM Araghchi tells the US: "Ceasefire or continued war via Israel — it cannot have both." Trump dismisses Lebanon as a "separate skirmish."
In Beirut’s seaside Ain Mreisseh neighbourhood, Civil Defence spokesperson Elie Khairallah told the Associated Press that a wounded woman had been pulled alive from the rubble overnight. A man was also found alive after his building collapsed in the capital’s southern suburbs. “The others so far have been killed,” Khairallah said.
Among those waiting was Mohammad Chehab, a Syrian man from Deir el-Zour, who said six of his 10 family members had been found, but others were still missing. “They’ve been searching all day,” he said, watching rescue workers dig.
Israel insists its war with the Iran-backed Hezbollah is not covered by the two-week ceasefire reached with Iran. Iran and mediator Pakistan say it is, and Tehran used that disagreement to justify closing the Strait of Hormuz again on Wednesday in response to the Israeli campaign.
Iran’s deputy foreign minister Saeed Khatibzadeh told the BBC that Iran had shut the strait after Israel committed an “intentional grave violation of the ceasefire,” warning: “You cannot have a cake and eat it at the same time. That was the message that Iran sent quite clearly, crystal-clearly, to Washington and to the Oval Office last night.”
UN Secretary-General António Guterres, in unusually strong language, “unequivocally” condemned the Israeli strikes in Lebanon, according to a statement by his spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric.
French President Emmanuel Macron said he had spoken with Lebanese President Joseph Aoun and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam to express “France’s full solidarity in the face of the indiscriminate strikes carried out by Israel.”
Of the attacks, he said, “We condemn these strikes in the strongest possible terms,” warning they posed a direct threat to the ceasefire’s survival. Macron separately urged Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian and US President Donald Trump that “each of the belligerents” must respect the truce, which he said “must open the way to comprehensive negotiations.”
British Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper told Sky News she was “deeply troubled about the escalating attacks that we saw from Israel in Lebanon yesterday,” and told the BBC the strikes were “completely wrong.” London and other European capitals have called on Israel to halt its attacks on Lebanon and on Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz.
The New York-based Soufan Centre warned in an analysis published Thursday that the tentative ceasefire “hovers on the verge of collapse,” with the Lebanon strikes the most immediate threat.
“Even if Lebanon was formally outside the deal, the scale of Israel’s strikes was likely to be viewed as escalatory, nonetheless,” it wrote. “Israel’s strikes can be understood both as an effort to drive a wedge between Iran and its proxies and as a response to being allegedly sidelined in the original ceasefire discussions.”
With US-Iran talks due to begin later this week in a fortified Islamabad, the question hanging over the region is whether the bombardment of Lebanon will bring the ceasefire down before negotiators even sit across the table.
(With inputs from AP)
Stay updated with the latest - Click here to follow us on Instagram
The fragile two-week ceasefire between Iran, Israel and the United States is facing uncertainties on Thursday, April 9, as Israel pressed on with a punishing air campaign against Hezbollah in Lebanon, drawing sharp international reactions and rocket fire in return.
Israeli attacks have killed at least 254 people and wounded 1,165 others, Al Jazeera reported, citing Lebanon’s Civil Defence, on Wednesday alone accounting for the deadliest single day of the latest Israel-Hezbollah war.
A fresh strike on the southern village of Abbasiyeh early Thursday killed at least seven more people and wounded others, news agency Associated Press reported. The Israeli military did not immediately acknowledge the Abbasiyeh strike.
In Beirut, Israel claimed it had killed Ali Yusuf Harshi, identified as a secretary and nephew of Hezbollah leader Naim Kassem, in Wednesday’s airstrikes on the capital. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in a post on X, said, “We continue to strike Hezbollah with force, precision, and determination. In Beirut, we eliminated Ali Youssef Kharshi, the personal secretary of Hezbollah terror organization Secretary-General Naim Qassem and one of the people closest to him.” He added that overnight the IDF had hit “crossings used to transfer thousands of weapons, rockets, and launchers, as well as weapons depots, launchers, and Hezbollah headquarters,” vowing: “Whoever acts against Israeli civilians—will be struck.”
Hezbollah did not immediately respond to the claim about Harshi, but sirens sounded in northern Israel early Thursday as the group claimed a rocket barrage across the border.
Two-week Iran-US ceasefire announced Truce
Pakistan PM Shehbaz Sharif announces an "immediate ceasefire everywhere including Lebanon" after mediating the US-Iran deal. Celebrations erupt in Tehran and Beirut's southern suburbs.
Netanyahu: Truce does NOT cover Lebanon Fracture
The Israeli PM publicly contradicts the mediator, saying Israel has "finger on the trigger" and will keep striking Hezbollah. The first cracks in the deal appear within minutes of the announcement.
Israel issues mass evacuation orders Warning
IDF orders civilians out of a 40-km zone from the border and reissues warnings for Beirut's southern suburbs. Residents of Tyre are told to flee specific buildings — a prelude to the largest strike of the war.
100+ strikes in 10 minutes — largest blow since 'Operation Beepers' Strike
Israel unleashes its largest coordinated assault of the war — hitting central Beirut (Corniche al-Mazraa), the Bekaa Valley, Sidon, Mount Lebanon and southern villages. Busy commercial areas struck without warning. Defence Minister Katz calls it the heaviest blow to Hezbollah since the 2024 pager attack.
Lebanon toll: 254 killed, 1,165 wounded Massacre
Lebanese Civil Defence confirms the deadliest single day of the Israel-Hezbollah war. President Joseph Aoun calls it a "massacre"; UN rights chief Volker Türk calls the scale "nothing short of horrific."
Iran closes the Strait of Hormuz — again Retaliation
Tehran announces re-closure of the strait — through which 20% of global oil flows — in direct response to the Lebanon strikes. The White House calls it "completely unacceptable" and demands it be reopened.
IRGC warning: Stop, or we hit back Live
Iran's Revolutionary Guards issue a final warning: "If aggression against Lebanon does not cease immediately, we will deliver a response." FM Araghchi tells the US: "Ceasefire or continued war via Israel — it cannot have both." Trump dismisses Lebanon as a "separate skirmish."
In Beirut’s seaside Ain Mreisseh neighbourhood, Civil Defence spokesperson Elie Khairallah told the Associated Press that a wounded woman had been pulled alive from the rubble overnight. A man was also found alive after his building collapsed in the capital’s southern suburbs. “The others so far have been killed,” Khairallah said.
Among those waiting was Mohammad Chehab, a Syrian man from Deir el-Zour, who said six of his 10 family members had been found, but others were still missing. “They’ve been searching all day,” he said, watching rescue workers dig.
Israel insists its war with the Iran-backed Hezbollah is not covered by the two-week ceasefire reached with Iran. Iran and mediator Pakistan say it is, and Tehran used that disagreement to justify closing the Strait of Hormuz again on Wednesday in response to the Israeli campaign.
Iran’s deputy foreign minister Saeed Khatibzadeh told the BBC that Iran had shut the strait after Israel committed an “intentional grave violation of the ceasefire,” warning: “You cannot have a cake and eat it at the same time. That was the message that Iran sent quite clearly, crystal-clearly, to Washington and to the Oval Office last night.”
UN Secretary-General António Guterres, in unusually strong language, “unequivocally” condemned the Israeli strikes in Lebanon, according to a statement by his spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric.
French President Emmanuel Macron said he had spoken with Lebanese President Joseph Aoun and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam to express “France’s full solidarity in the face of the indiscriminate strikes carried out by Israel.”
Of the attacks, he said, “We condemn these strikes in the strongest possible terms,” warning they posed a direct threat to the ceasefire’s survival. Macron separately urged Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian and US President Donald Trump that “each of the belligerents” must respect the truce, which he said “must open the way to comprehensive negotiations.”
British Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper told Sky News she was “deeply troubled about the escalating attacks that we saw from Israel in Lebanon yesterday,” and told the BBC the strikes were “completely wrong.” London and other European capitals have called on Israel to halt its attacks on Lebanon and on Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz.
The New York-based Soufan Centre warned in an analysis published Thursday that the tentative ceasefire “hovers on the verge of collapse,” with the Lebanon strikes the most immediate threat.
“Even if Lebanon was formally outside the deal, the scale of Israel’s strikes was likely to be viewed as escalatory, nonetheless,” it wrote. “Israel’s strikes can be understood both as an effort to drive a wedge between Iran and its proxies and as a response to being allegedly sidelined in the original ceasefire discussions.”
With US-Iran talks due to begin later this week in a fortified Islamabad, the question hanging over the region is whether the bombardment of Lebanon will bring the ceasefire down before negotiators even sit across the table.
(With inputs from AP)
