drawn into<\/a> the US-Israel war on Iran on March 2, when the Tehran-aligned Hezbollah fired rockets at northern Israel, citing continued Israeli attacks on the country and the killing of Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei on February 28.<\/p>\nWhile the US and Iran agreed a ceasefire on April 8, Israel has not halted its campaign in Lebanon, insisting the two fronts are separate.<\/p>\n
Iran, however, has long maintained that any peace deal with Washington must include an end to fighting in Lebanon.<\/p>\n
Announcing the end of its strikes on Israel on Monday, Iran\u2019s military warned that continued aggression \u2013 including in southern Lebanon \u2013 would be met with \u201cmuch more severe and crushing measures\u201d.<\/p>\n
But Israeli Minister of Defence Israel Katz rejected the warning, pledging to press ahead with operations against Hezbollah and to launch attacks on Beirut\u2019s southern suburbs in response to any strikes on northern Israel.<\/p>\n
\u201cAny Iranian attempt to link Lebanon and Iran and attack Israel will be met with great force,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam, meanwhile, said on Monday that Israel has carried out nearly 3,500 air strikes, 407 demolitions, and six so-called \u201crazing\u201d operations \u2013 which have flattened entire villages \u2013 since April 16.<\/p>\n
The Lebanese Ministry of Health\u00a0said the overall death toll from the Israeli offensive since March 2 has risen to 3,637, with a further 11,188 wounded.<\/p>\n
More than one million people, or a fifth of Lebanon\u2019s population, have been displaced.<\/p>\n
Salam\u2019s office said that government shelters \u201chave reached maximum absorption capacity in Beirut, Sidon, and all other regions\u201d.<\/p>\n
The International Rescue Committee (IRC), meanwhile, warned that Lebanon\u2019s humanitarian crisis was worsening, with 94 percent of displaced people struggling to meet their basic needs.<\/p>\n
Many of those returning to southern Lebanon were finding their homes or entire villages destroyed, said Rick Bartoldus, the IRC\u2019s country director for Lebanon.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe humanitarian needs are massive, and if we have any hope of recovery, we need to see a lasting ceasefire,\u201d he told Al Jazeera.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Israeli forces have killed at least 14 people and wounded dozens in air attacks across southern Lebanon after…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":483364,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[85,46,48084,88,47,43,162198],"class_list":["post-483363","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-israel","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-israel-attacks-lebanon","tag-lebanon","tag-middle-east","tag-news","tag-us-israel-war-on-iran"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/483363","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=483363"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/483363\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/483364"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=483363"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=483363"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=483363"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}