Israel pummelled southern Lebanon on Thursday, state media and correspondents said, a day after it targeted a Hezbollah commander in its first strike on Beirut's southern suburbs since a truce sought to end weeks of fighting.
The Israeli army said on Thursday that the strike on the southern suburbs killed "the Commander of Hezbollah's 'Radwan Force' Unit", an elite unit within the armed group Hezbollah.
A ceasefire in the war between Hezbollah and Israel began on April 17, but combat has largely not stopped in southern Lebanon.
Wednesday's strike near the capital, however, came as a shock in Lebanon.
Media photographs taken in the southern suburbs showed the top floors of a residential building totally destroyed, and rescuers searching through the rubble on Thursday morning.
Hezbollah has not retaliated for the attack.
Lebanese state media reported Israeli strikes across a number of southern towns and villages, and the Israeli army issued fresh evacuation warnings to three villages north of the Litani River, and outside the area occupied by Israeli troops following their ground invasion of the border area.
Some of the Israeli strikes, on the southern city of Nabatieh, targeted a shopping centre and residential buildings, state media and a correspondent said.
In the nearby village of Toul, two rescuers were wounded in an Israeli strike as they were dispatched following a previous attack, spokesperson Mahmoud Karaki said.
The team's ambulance was heavily damaged, he added.
The Israeli military said in a statement on Thursday that an "explosive drone impact" wounded four soldiers - one severely - in southern Lebanon the previous day.
Despite the ceasefire, Hezbollah regularly claims attacks against Israeli forces occupying parts of southern Lebanon.
Since the war began on March 2, Israeli strikes have killed more than 2,700 people in Lebanon.
The Israeli military says it has lost 17 soldiers and a contractor in southern Lebanon. - AFP
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