How significant is Hamas in Lebanon?published at 15:33 British Summer Time 5 October

15:33 BST 5 October

Raffi Berg
Digital Middle East editor

We just reported the death of two senior Hamas figures in northern Lebanon in an Israeli strike.

Hamas has a much smaller presence in Lebanon than in Gaza. It has been operating in Lebanon since the late 1980s, although it was for a long time marginal among other Palestinian armed groups long established there.

The relationship between Hamas in Lebanon and Hezbollah - the dominant force there - has fluctuated: initially the two were allies, but this ruptured when Hamas and Hezbollah supported different sides in the Syrian civil war.

However, Hamas later distanced itself from supporting the Syrian opposition and grew closer to Hezbollah again.

Hamas’s popularity has grown in the multiple Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon, as has its armed activity. In 2019, Saleh al-Arouri, the deputy political leader of Hamas, relocated there to build up its military infrastructure.

Last April, a massive barrage of rockets was fired at Israel from Lebanon - something Israel blamed on Hamas. Arouri was killed in an Israeli air strike in Beirut this January.

His death signalled that Lebanon is also in the scope of Israel’s stated aim of destroying the group.

Image source, Reuters

The Israeli military says it has killed two senior Hamas figures who were operating in Lebanon.

Muhammad Hussein Ali al-Mahmoud was killed in an air strike earlier today, the IDF says, describing him as the groups "executive authority' in Lebanon.

It also says Said Alaa Naif Ali was killed in an overnight Israeli operation in the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli.

Hamas's armed wing confirmed the deaths of two of its members following Israeli strikes in Lebanon, but provided different names for them: Mohammed Hussein Al-Louise and Saeed Attallah Ali.

As we reported this morning, Hamas-affiliated media said a commander named Saeed Atallah had been killed in an Israeli drone strike.

Images shared with us in the past hour and a half show smoke rising over Beirut, following a strike in the south of the city.

We earlier reported that the strike appeared to have hit the Burj el Brajneh area, which is close to the airport:

Image source, EPA

Image source, EPA

Nick Beake
Reporting from the Israel-Lebanon border

Here in northern Israel we have heard the latest volley of rockets that Hezbollah continues to fire into Israel.

One explosion was about a hundred metres away.

People living here typically have about 10 to 15 seconds to reach a shelter before rockets land - or more often, are intercepted by the Iron Dome.

This has become a daily occurrence for nearly a year since Hezbollah said it began firing in solidarity with Hamas in Gaza.

The constant stream is the central justification for the Israeli ground invasion into south Lebanon this past week.

The prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu says the objective is to push Hezbollah back and destroy their weapons, and create a buffer zone so that thousands of Israeli families near the border can return home.

The IDF says Hezbollah has fired more than 700 rockets in the last four days.

Image source, Getty Images

While fighting between Israel and Hezbollah continues in Lebanon, the conflict in Gaza is also ongoing.

This morning, for the first time in weeks, an evacuation order was issued for parts of central Gaza.

An IDF warning said it is prepared to use “great force” against Hamas fighters remaining in the area.

At least 187 Palestinians have been killed and 485 injured in the week to Friday, Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry reported. The total death toll in the territory now stands at 41,825.

The Israeli invasion of Gaza began after Hamas launched a deadly raid into Israel almost one year ago.

BBC teams in Beirut have reported hearing another strike in the south of the city.

Information is still emerging but it appears to have hit the Burj el Brajneh area, which is close to the airport.

This would be the third strike in that area so far today.

We'll bring you more on this when we have it.

Earlier, Hezbollah said it had targeted an airbase near the city of Haifa in northern Israel.

An update from the IDF says two projectiles were identified crossing into Israeli territory from Lebanon.

One of these was intercepted by the Israeli air force and the other fell in an open area, the IDF says.

In the last hour, there have also been reports of sirens sounding in the central Galilee area of northern Israel.

Image source, EPA

Rescue workers have been unable to search the site of an Israeli strike reported to have targeted the man widely considered to be a potential new leader of Hezbollah, according to a report from Reuters news agency.

Yesterday, US outlets reported the IDF had targeted Hashem Safieddine overnight on Thursday. Some analysts say he was the most likely candidate to replace Hassan Nasrallah, who was killed in a separate Israeli strike last week.

Continued air strikes on Beirut since the reported attack on Safieddine have made the site unreachable, Reuters reported, citing unnamed Lebanese security sources.

Hezbollah has not commented on Safieddine's fate.

Recent pictures from Beirut's southern suburbs reveal the damage from overnight strikes.

As we reported earlier, the Israeli military issued several warnings in the early hours telling people to move away from what it said were Hezbollah facilities in the area.

Image source, Reuters

Image source, EPA

Image source, EPA

Israel says it is continuing its ground operation in southern Lebanon, with raids on "terrorist infrastructure" taking place above and below ground, according to a new update.

The IDF says it has destroyed Hezbollah weapons caches which were "embedded in mountainous, thicketed, and densely built-up areas" - as well as being "rigged with explosives".

It also says it has "dismantled tunnel shafts used by Hezbollah terrorists" in underground combat near the border.

In recent raids, ground forces and the air force have worked together to kill "dozens" of Hezbollah fighters, the IDF says.

As we reported earlier, Hezbollah said it was fighting with Israeli troops in the Adaisseh area.

Image source, Reuters

More than 200,000 people have fled Lebanon into neighbouring Syria "as a result of Israeli air strikes", according to the UN.

An update from UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Filippo Grandi, says this number includes both Lebanese citizens and Syrians who were living in Lebanon. Figures from the Lebanese government put the total higher, at 300,000.

Yesterday, an Israeli air strike hit near the main border crossing point between the two countries, effectively cutting off vehicle access.

Israel's military claimed it hit Hezbollah targets near the Masnaa crossing, and earlier claimed the group was using it to smuggle weapons into Lebanon.

People continued to make the journey across the border on foot, with pictures showing families clambering over rubble to leave the country.

Image source, EPA

Countries are continuing to evacuate citizens from Lebanon, with flights taking off from Beirut airport even amid near-daily Israeli strikes on parts of the city.

The UK has flown out three charter flights so far with a fourth due to leave on Sunday.

At least 23 countries are making efforts to fly nationals out of the country, according to a report from Reuters.

Some are securing seats on existing commercial flights, while others are sending military planes.

The South Korean air force flew 97 citizens out of Lebanon earlier today.

Hezbollah says it's fired rockets at the Ramat David airbase near the city of Haifa in northern Israel.

In recent updates, the militant group also says it hit an Israeli tank with a missile near the Lebanon-Israel border.

Israel has not commented, but sirens have sounded across northern Israel this morning. We'll bring you more when we have it.

We can now bring you images from the site of an apparent Israeli strike on Tripoli, northern Lebanon, which reportedly killed a Hamas commander.

People were seen gathering next to cars covered in rubble beneath a damaged apartment block, which is within a Palestinian refugee camp.

Saeed Atallah was reportedly killed alongside his wife and two daughters.

Image source, Reuters

Image source, Reuters

Joel Gunter
Reporting from Beirut

At least four hospitals closed yesterday in southern Lebanon because of Israeli airstrikes, officials at the hospitals say, severely limiting health cover for the remaining population there.

At the Marjayoun government hospital, a core team of 20 doctors and nurses had held on for days after the rest of its 120 staff stopped coming to work because of the strikes, officials said, but the hospital eventually closed on Friday following a direct hit.

Hospital director Dr Mounes Kalakish told the BBC he had no choice but to suspend services after the strike hit two ambulances at the hospital’s entrance, killing seven paramedics.

“We held on for as long as we could,” he said. “But the nurses and doctors were terrified after the strike. We tried to calm them and carry on but it was not possible.”

The hospital’s emergency director, Dr Shoshana Mazraani, said she heard the cries of the paramedics who were hit. She ran towards the damaged ambulances, but was warned to stay back by colleagues who feared a follow-up strike.

The closure of the hospital on Friday was a “tragedy for the region”, Dr Mazraani said.

“We serve a huge population here, many villages. We had 45 inpatient beds, all now empty. We were the only hospital providing dialysis in the region. We have had to turn away emergency patients and tell others to leave.”

At least 37 healthcare facilities have closed over the past two weeks, since Israel began its air bombardment of Lebanon, according to the World Health Organization.

In a statement on Friday night, the Israeli army accused Hezbollah of using medical vehicles to transport fighters and weapons.

In a separate statement, it said it had “made many efforts to prevent damage to non-involved people and civilian infrastructure, and this is in contrast to the systematic use by the terrorist organisation Hezbollah”.

We can now bring you an update from the Israeli military, which has issued a statement on a strike it carried out last night.

Late yesterday evening, there were reports of an Israeli strike on the grounds of a hospital in the southern Lebanon town of Bint Jbeil.

The Israeli military now says it struck Hezbollah members who were operating inside a command centre located "inside a mosque adjacent to the Salah Ghandour Hospital".

The hospital says nine members of its medical staff were injured, but most others had evacuated after an Israeli warning.

Nick Beake
Reporting from northern Israel

We’ve been asking the Israel Defense Forces about Hezbollah claims of heavy fighting around the village of Adaisseh, right on the border in southern Lebanon.

The IDF tells us they’re not able to comment on the latest clashes overnight and would not be drawn on whether Israeli troops were injured.

Here in the north of Israel we have heard more loud explosions in the distance – louder than yesterday.

But what we see and hear in this location is just a snapshot of what is an expanding Israeli operation.

Earlier, we brought you an update from Hezbollah, which claimed to have forced Israeli troops to retreat from the border village of Adaisseh overnight.

In a new update, the group says it's in an "ongoing" clash with Israeli soldiers in the same region.

It's not easy to say, but Beirut is now a war zonepublished at 08:07 British Summer Time 5 October

08:07 BST 5 October

Nafiseh Kohnavard
Middle East correspondent, BBC World Service, in Beirut

Image source, Nafiseh Kohnavard / BBC

Last night in Beirut we heard the sound of massive explosions, one after another. I counted 12 air strikes on the southern suburbs of Beirut.

The area hit, which everyone calls "Dahieh", in fact in Arabic means "suburb". Somehow that gives a feeling that the area that is attacked is not Beirut itself. But in reality it is now.

Dahieh is just 10 minutes' drive from my home in Achrafieh, a Christian area that is considered as eastern Beirut.

We have Israeli surveillance drones day and night over the city. They just don't go away. The buzzing has become a background noise.

Different corners of the city now are filled with temporary tents. Yesterday in Beirut’s famous Martyrs Square I met a few families who had fled there - not because their houses were bombed, but because attacks happened only five minutes' drive from them. None of those people were from Dahieh.

As I write these lines, I still hear explosions. It’s another round of air strikes on the "southern suburbs" of the city that are not suburbs any more.

It is not easy to articulate this, but as a correspondent who has covered several conflicts, I think Beirut is now a war zone - no matter if we want to believe it or not.

With all these strikes, drones, jets and displacement, this is a war zone.

Image source, Nafiseh Kohnavard / BBC

Here's more on the apparent killing of Saeed Atallah, a leader of Hamas's armed wing, which we mentioned earlier.

Hamas-affiliated newspaper Filastin reports he was killed in a strike on the Beddawi Palestinian refugee camp in Tripoli, northern Lebanon, along with three members of his family.

An-Nahar, a Lebanese daily newspaper, says his wife and two children were among the dead.

It also says the air strike - which An-Nahar attributed to an Israeli drone - completely destroyed the apartment Atallah and his family were staying in.

While Hamas has yet to confirm the death, Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), an allied militant group, also says Atallah, his wife and two daughters were killed.