Israeli Minister threatens to ‘Burn’ Lebanon after alleged Hezbollah attack

Israel’s Minister of Energy and Infrastructure Eli Cohen warned that Lebanon “should burn” in a social media post after an attack alleged to have been carried out by the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah left children and teenagers dead on Saturday.

Hezbollah has denied involvement in an apparent rocket strike that Israeli emergency services say killed 10 people, including minors, at a soccer field in the Israel-occupied Golan Heights.

The attack, which comes amid worsening Israel-Lebanon border violence in the midst of war raging in the Gaza Strip, was first reported Saturday by local media. It was later confirmed by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), which has said those killed were between the ages of 10 and 20 years old, and that 20 more were injured.

“Lebanon should burn,” Cohen wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

“We must take significant action in the north, which will exact a heavy price from Lebanon and Hezbollah,” the Israeli Cabinet official said. “What cruel terrorist organization shoots at playing children?”

“Sending condolences to the families of those murdered from Majdal Shams, our Druze brothers, who lost their loved ones today,” he said.

In a statement shared with Newsweek by the IDF, spokesperson Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari called it “the deadliest attack on Israeli civilians since October 7th,” when a Hamas-led attack on Israel killed around 1,200 people, the majority of them civilians, according to Israeli officials.

Following what the IDF called a “situational assessment and the intelligence in our possession,” the Israeli military stated that “the rocket launch toward Majdal Shams was carried out by the Hezbollah terrorist organization.

” The group, however, denied any role in the attack.

“The Islamic Resistance in Lebanon categorically denies allegations made by some ‘Israeli’ media outlets and various media platforms about its involvement in targeting Majdal Shams,” a Hezbollah spokesperson said in a statement shared with Newsweek. “The Islamic Resistance has absolutely nothing to do with the incident and denies all false allegations in this regard.”

Source: Bellinghamherald.com