Reported nighttime attacks come day after three soldiers were seriously injured by Hezbollah drone; IDF names second senior Hezbollah commander killed in Saturday strikes.
Lebanese media reported Israeli airstrikes in the Ali Taher Ridge in southern Lebanon Saturday overnight, a day after three Israeli soldiers were seriously wounded by an explosive drone launched by Hezbollah. The reported strikes came hours after residents of the Upper Galilee were notified by local authorities that explosions were expected to be heard due to IDF activity in Lebanon. With fighting threatening to ramp up in Lebanon and in Gaza, Defense Minister Israel Katz said in a Sunday morning post on X: “No score on any front will remain unsettled.”
He added: “We will forcefully defend our soldiers and citizens.” His comments come after overnight reports of strikes in southern Lebanon, following an attack on troops early Saturday in which three soldiers were wounded. Israel has not confirmed the reports. Earlier Israeli strikes killed 11 in Lebanon, according to local authorities on Saturday, including three children and two women. On Sunday, the Israel Defense Forces said it had killed a senior Hezbollah commander in an airstrike in the southern Lebanon town of Deir al-Zahrani the previous day. It said the Saturday morning strike on Ali Muhammad Fakhr al-Din came in response to a Hezbollah explosive drone attack in the predawn hours Saturday that seriously wounded three soldiers.
Lebanese media reported that the Deir al-Zahrani strike on Saturday morning killed two people. Al-Din, also known as Abu Hassan Alaa, was identified by the IDF as a “senior commander” in Hezbollah’s Badr regional division. The regional unit is tasked with the area north of the Litani River. The IDF said that as part of his role, Hassan Alaa took part in numerous attacks on Israeli troops in southern Lebanon. The statement from the IDF did not address the claims of overnight strikes in southern Lebanon. The army had announced previously that among those killed Saturday was Ali Samir Al-Haj Hassan, a battalion commander in Hezbollah’s elite Radwan Force, who was hit in a strike in the town of Ansar. (Ed note:The picture above was taken in the southern Lebanese coastal city of Sidon, and shows lines of cars as people flee their city on August 15, 2026.) (Read More)
