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BEIRUT — Airstrikes blamed on Israel killed four Lebanese civilians Tuesday, including two journalists, in a fresh escalation of fighting along the Israel-Lebanon border, where Hezbollah fighters and Israeli forces have been engaged in daily exchanges of fire over the past six weeks.
A separate strike killed at least four people traveling in a vehicle near the border in southern Lebanon, the Lebanese National News Agency reported. Hamas said at least one of the dead was a Hamas fighter.
Hezbollah vowed to respond to the killings, then announced that it had fired rockets at northern Israel in retaliation, targeting an Israeli military base in Beit Hillel, a meeting of Israeli soldiers in Avivim and an Israeli military intelligence unit in Manara. There were no immediate reports of casualties.
The clashes along the Lebanon-Israel border are nowhere near as intense as the fighting in Gaza, but they have been steadily escalating in recent weeks, compounding concerns that an incident or misunderstanding could spark a far more devastating war between Israel and Lebanon.
Most of the exchanges have taken place within four to five miles of the border on either side, adhering to an unspoken agreement that has prevailed between Israel and Hezbollah since they last fought in 2006 not to allow hostilities to escalate into full-blown war. But the range and the intensity of the strikes have been ticking up, even as civilian targets have been considered off-limits.
Tuesday’s attacks brought to at least 15 the number of Lebanese civilians killed in the past six weeks, marking one of the bloodiest days on the Lebanese side of the border since the conflict began on Oct. 8, with Hezbollah firing shells at Israeli troops in a gesture of solidarity with Hamas. In addition, at least 77 Hezbollah fighters have been killed and 11 Israelis, most of them soldiers.
The deaths of two journalists working for the Beirut-based Al Mayadeen TV channel brought to three the number of journalists killed in Lebanon in the cross-border exchanges, raising concerns in Lebanon that Israel might be targeting journalists. Al Mayadeen identified them as reporter Farah Omar and cameraman Rabih al-Maamari, and said a civilian who was accompanying them was also killed when an Israeli warplane fired two missiles at their camera position.
An 80-year-old woman was killed earlier in the day in an Israeli airstrike against a border town, Lebanon’s National News Agency said.
Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati accused Israel of deliberately targeting the journalists. “Its goal is to silence the media that exposes its crimes and attacks,” he said.
Israel did not respond to the allegations but said its aircraft had been operating in the area against what a statement from the Israel Defense Forces called “terrorist cells.”
An investigation by the French organization Reporters Without Borders into the killing in October of a Reuters cameraman, Issam Abdallah, concluded that Abdallah and his co-workers, several of whom were injured, were “explicitly targeted.” There was no Hezbollah fire coming from the area at the time, and the group of journalists had clearly identified themselves as press, the organization said.
Israel has said it was “very sorry” for Abdallah’s death but has not publicly acknowledged responsibility.
Suzan Haidamous in Washington contributed to this report.