According to Israel, there was heavy fighting with Hezbollah in southern Lebanon

Israel said heavy fighting broke out with Hezbollah in southern Lebanon after its paratroopers and commandos launched raids there, ahead of a widely expected ground attack and after devastating air strikes against Hezbollah's leadership.

The Israeli military said operations in Lebanon began on Monday evening and involved the elite 98th Division, which was deployed two weeks ago from Gaza to the northern front, where it has been fighting Hamas for months.

It said its air force and artillery supported ground forces that conducted “limited, localized and targeted ground attacks” against Hezbollah in villages in southern Lebanon that posed “an immediate threat to Israeli communities in northern Israel.”

Israel dealt a major blow to Hezbollah, Iran's most powerful proxy in the Middle East, by assassinating its leader Hassan Nasrallah in Beirut last week, eliminating a formidable figure that made it Lebanon's main military and political force.

Despite its greatest successes against Hezbollah in decades, Israel has indicated that it is prepared for a full-scale invasion of Lebanon, with the stated aim of ensuring thousands of its citizens who have fled Hezbollah rockets safely return to their communities near the northern border to enable.

A Lebanese security source told Reuters that Israeli units entered Lebanon overnight for reconnaissance and probing operations.

Lebanese troops also withdrew from positions along the border, the source added.

A spokesman for the Lebanese army did not confirm or deny the move.

The Lebanese army has historically remained on the sidelines of major conflicts with Israel and has not fired on the Israeli military during the last year of hostilities.

The operation in Lebanon represents an escalation of the Middle East conflict between Israel and Iranian-backed terrorists, which now threatens to involve the United States and Iran.

Residents of the Lebanese border town of Aita al-Shaab reported heavy shelling and the noise of helicopters and drones overhead.

Flares were repeatedly fired over the Lebanese border town of Rmeish, lighting up the night sky.

The Lebanese armed group Hezbollah said on Tuesday it had twice attacked Israeli troops across the border in Metula with artillery and rocket fire, but did not mention that Israel had launched ground operations in Lebanon.

An Israeli strike early Tuesday in Lebanon targeted Mounir Maqdah, the commander of the Lebanese branch of the military wing of the Palestinian Fatah movement, the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, according to two Palestinian security officials.

His fate was unknown.

The attack hit a building in the crowded Palestinian refugee camp of Ain al-Hilweh near the southern city of Sidon, the sources said.

It was the first attack on the largest Palestinian camp in Lebanon since cross-border hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel broke out almost a year ago.

In Syria, three civilians were killed and nine others injured in an Israeli airstrike on the capital Damascus, Syrian state media said on Tuesday, citing a military source.

The Israeli military said it does not comment on foreign media reports.

Israel has been carrying out attacks against Iran-linked targets in Syria for years, but has increased attacks since the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas attacked Israel's southern territory on October 7, 2023.

According to Israeli sources, Hamas killed 1,200 people and took around 250 hostages in its attack on Israel.

In response, Israel launched a massive attack on Hamas in Gaza, reducing most of Palestinian territory to rubble, displacing most of its 2.3 million people and killing more than 41,300 Palestinians, according to Gaza's health ministry.

Strikes against Beirut

Israel's operations in Lebanon follow the deadly detonation of Hezbollah booby-trapped pagers, two weeks of airstrikes and the killing of Nasrallah on Friday.

The intense airstrikes have eliminated several Hezbollah commanders, but also killed about 1,000 civilians and forced a million to flee, according to the Lebanese government.

Strikes broke out in Beirut's southern suburbs overnight, according to a security source.

A Reuters reporter witnessed a flash of light and a series of loud explosions about an hour after the Israeli military warned residents to evacuate areas near buildings believed to house Hezbollah infrastructure in the south of the capital.

At least 95 people were killed and 172 injured in Israeli attacks on Lebanon's southern regions, the eastern Bekaa Valley and Beirut in the last 24 hours, the Lebanese Health Ministry said early Tuesday.

Hezbollah deputy leader Naim Qassem said Monday that “resistance forces are ready for a ground fight,” adding that Hezbollah continued to fire rockets to a depth of 93 miles into Israeli territory.

The White House and the US State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Israel's ground operations in Lebanon, but on Monday US President Joe Biden called for a ceasefire.