Hamas fired a barrage of rockets at Tel Aviv on the one-year anniversary of the October 7 attacks while Israelis held memorials to mourn the victims of the deadly assault. Meanwhile, large explosions were reportedly heard across southern Beirut for another night as Israeli forces continued to pound the Lebanese capital. At least 10 people were wounded in the Israeli city of Haifa following a Hezbollah rocket attack.
October 7th marks one year since Israel began its military attacks in Gaza, resulting in 365 days of persistent Israeli bombardment on civilians and Hamas militants in Gaza. In the early hours of Monday, Israeli civilians gathered at the site of the Nova Music Festival, where Hamas militants murdered 347 people and took 40 others hostage on October 7, 2023. Across the northern border, the Israeli Air Force (IAF) launched fresh strikes on Hezbollah’s intelligence headquarters, a weapons storage facility, and other sites in Beirut. Aside from Lebanon’s capital, the IAF also struck storage facilities, a command center, and a launcher in the Beqaa area of southern Lebanon.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) confirms Lebanon’s Hezbollah launched more than 120 projectiles into Israeli territory on the eve of the October 7th attacks. The National News Agency, a Lebanese state-run news agency, reported Israeli attacks in the Roueiss area in the southern suburbs of Beirut. Israel continued to call for evacuations in and around south Lebanon on Sunday, displacing civilians in 124 villages where Israel suspects Hezbollah embeds.
On Sunday, a Hezbollah rocket attack in Haifa, northern Israel, killed at least five people. This attack marks the first strike in Israel’s north since tensions escalated with the Hezbollah. Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant told CNN, “Israel is closely coordinating with the United States as it prepares to strike back at Iran but will make its own, independent decisions about how to retaliate.” Last week, Biden opposed Israel’s strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities, but Gallant stressed that all options are still “on the table.”
Despite holding talks with the United States, Israel’s Netanyahu has received support from France’s Macron. Following Macron’s call for an arms embargo against Israel, the heads of state spoke on Sunday. Netanyahu reiterated the importance of striking the “Iranian terror axis” rather than imposing stringent restrictions. The leaders agreed to revisit the discussion when French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot meets with Israeli officials on Monday during his visit to Israel and the West Bank.
Philemon Yang, the president of the 79th session of the UN General Assembly, called for peace in the Middle East on the first anniversary of the Hamas-led October 7 attacks on Israel. The Cameroonian politician urged world leaders to impose an “immediate ceasefire, the immediate and unconditional release of all [captives], and a return to dialogue to find diplomatic solutions to the conflicts in the region.”
As we mark the one-year anniversary of the brutal attacks by Hamas against Israel on 7 October 2023, we need to end the human suffering in the Middle East, and we need to end it now.
We need the immediate and unconditional release of all hostages.
International law must be… pic.twitter.com/MgEMHc51zy
— UN GA President (@UN_PGA) October 7, 2024
In light of these developments, the Lebanese government has postponed the start of the new school year to November 2nd. Abbas Halabi, Lebanon’s education minister, reports that approximately 400,000 students and 40,000 teachers have been forced to leave their homes nationwide due to escalating tensions and the mass exodus. The Lebanese health ministry reported an estimated 1,400 deaths since Hezbollah and Israel exchanged fire.
