Strike on Beirut targeted Iranian commanders, Israel sayspublished at 18:46 GMT
18:46 GMT
Alice Cuddy
Reporting from Beirut, Lebanon
In central Beirut, Lebanese police were conducting investigations today inside the Ramada Hotel, which was hit by an Israeli drone strike overnight.
The Israeli military said the “precise strike” had targeted commanders of Iran’s elite Quds Force while they were meeting at the hotel. It named five men, including three “key” commanders killed in the strike, saying they had been responsible for intelligence gathering and transferring funds to Hezbollah.
The Lebanese health ministry earlier said four people had been killed and 10 injured.
It is the first Israeli strike to hit in the heart of Beirut since hostilities between Israel and the Iran-backed group Hezbollah resumed last Monday. Another hotel on the outskirts of the capital was targeted earlier in the week.
The streets outside the Ramada – which is located along the coast and is normally popular with business people and tourists but in recent days has been housing some people displaced from their homes – were bustling this afternoon.
People driving past looked out of their windows at the damage from the strike, which hit a corner room at the hotel, leaving the walls blackened and the windows smashed.
On the street outside, I spoke to 43-year-old Mohamed Abbas, who arrived in the Lebanese capital two days ago after being displaced from his home in the south of the country and has been working in a barbershop on the street below the room that was hit.
“This is the centre of Beirut. This is something new,” he said, adding that he believed it showed “Israel doesn’t have a red line”.