Israel says it has killed a Hezbollah official who is expected to become the group's next leader

BEIRUT (AP) — Israel said Tuesday that one of its airstrikes outside Beirut earlier this month killed a Hezbollah official widely believed to have replaced the militant group's longtime leader, who died last month was killed in an Israeli airstrike.

There was no immediate confirmation from Hezbollah about the fate of Hashem Safieddine, a powerful cleric expected to succeed Hassan Nasrallahone of the group's founders.

Safieddine was killed in early October in an attack that Israel, whose airstrikes in southern Lebanon in recent months also killed 25 other Hezbollah leaders, said many of Hezbollah's top leadersleaving the group in disarray.

Last week Israel killed Hamas' supreme leader, Yahya Sinwarduring a battle in Gaza.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said during a trip to Israel that leaders there should use Sinwar's death as an opportunity End the war in Gaza and ensuring the release of hostages captured during the deadly Hamas attack that sparked the war. Blinken also stressed that Israel needs to do more to increase the influx Humanitarian aid for Palestinians.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office described his meeting with Blinken, which lasted more than two hours, as “friendly and productive.”

The Beirut suburb where Safieddine was killed was hit by renewed airstrikes on Tuesday, including one a building was razed to the ground Israel said Hezbollah facilities were housed there. The collapse sent smoke and debris flying into the air several hundred meters from where a Hezbollah spokesman had just briefed reporters about a weekend drone strike that damaged Netanyahu's home.

Tuesday's airstrikes came 40 minutes after Israel reportedly issued an evacuation warning for two buildings in the area used by Hezbollah. The Hezbollah press conference nearby was cut short, and an Associated Press photographer a picture was taken a rocket that flew towards the building just before it was destroyed. There were no immediate reports of casualties.

Hezbollah's chief spokesman, Mohammed Afif, said the group was behind Saturday's drone attack on Netanyahu's home in the coastal city of Caesarea. Israel said neither the prime minister nor his wife were home at the time.

Blinken's meetings with Netanyahu and other Israeli leaders were part of his 11th visit to the region since Israel's outbreak the Israel-Hamas war. He landed hours after Hezbollah fired a barrage of rockets into central Israel, triggering air raid sirens in populated areas and at the international airport, but there was no apparent damage or injuries.

Hospitals in Lebanon fear being attacked by Israel

An Israeli airstrike destroyed several buildings across from the country's largest public hospital in Beirut late Monday, killing 18 people and wounding at least 60 others. The Israeli military said it struck a Hezbollah target, without elaborating, and said it did not target the hospital itself.

AP reporters visited Rafik Hariri University Hospital on Tuesday. They saw broken windows in the hospital's pharmacy and dialysis center, which were full of patients at the time.

Staff at another Beirut hospital feared it could be targeted after Israel claimed Hezbollah had hidden hundreds of millions of dollars in cash and gold in its basement, without providing evidence.

The director of the Sahel General Hospital denied the allegations and invited journalists to tour the hospital and its two underground floors on Tuesday. AP reporters saw no signs of militants or anything unusual.

The few remaining patients had been evacuated following the Israeli military's announcement the evening before.

“We have been living in fear and terror for 24 hours,” said hospital director Mazen Alame. “There’s nothing under the hospital.”

Many in Lebanon fear Israel could attack its hospitals in the same way It has raided medical facilities across the Gaza Strip. The Israeli military has accused Hamas and other militants of using hospitals for military purposes, a charge denied by medical staff.

Lebanon's Health Ministry said on Tuesday that 63 people were killed in the past 24 hours, bringing the death toll from last year's conflict between Israel and Hezbollah to 2,546. The military said three Israeli soldiers were killed on Tuesday, one in Gaza, one in Lebanon and one in a rocket attack in northern Israel.

Blinken is trying to restart efforts for a ceasefire in Gaza

During his meeting with Netanyahu and other Israeli leaders, Blinken emphasized the need to dramatically increase the amount of humanitarian aid reaching Gaza, according to US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller. Blinken and US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin have made the need for further aid in Gaza clear in a letter to Israeli officials last week.

Miller said Blinken also stressed the importance of ending fighting between Israel and Hezbollah, which escalated earlier this month when Israel began a ground invasion in southern Lebanon.

The United States, Egypt and Qatar have brokered months of talks between Israel and Hamas, trying to reach an agreement in which the militants would release dozens of hostages in return for an end to the war, a permanent ceasefire and the release of Palestinian prisoners.

But both Israel and Hamas accused each other of doing so new and unacceptable requirements over the summer, and talks ended in August. Hamas says its demands have not changed since Sinwar's killing.

Israel said it invaded Lebanon to try to stop Hezbollah's near-daily rocket attacks since the war began in Gaza. Israel has declared that it is planning an attack on Iran – which supports both Hamas and Hezbollah – in response to its ballistic missile attack on Israel earlier this month.

War is raging in Lebanon and the northern Gaza Strip

The US has also tried to broker a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah, but those efforts failed as tensions rose last month with a series of Israeli attacks resulting in fatalities Nasrallah and most of his senior commanders.

Israel has carried out waves of heavy airstrikes in southern Beirut and in the south and east of the country, areas where Hezbollah has a large presence. Hezbollah has fired thousands of rockets, missiles and drones into Israel over the past year, including some that reached the country's populous center.

On October 7, 2023, Hamas-led militants in Israel killed around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took another 250 hostage. About 100 of the prisoners are still held in Gaza, a third of whom are believed to be dead.

Israel's retaliatory offensive has killed more than 42,000 Palestinians in Gaza and injured tens of thousands, according to local health authorities. Authorities did not say how many were combatants, but said more than half were women and children. It has also caused widespread devastation, displacing about 90% of Gaza's 2.3 million residents.

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Sarah El Deeb reported from Beirut. Kareem Chehayeb, Sally Abou AlJoud and Bassem Mroue in Beirut and Melanie Lidman in Tel Aviv contributed to this report.

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