‘Everyone is afraid’
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused arch-foe Iran, which backs Hamas, Hezbollah, and other armed groups, of plunging “our region deeper… into war.”
“There is nowhere in the Middle East Israel cannot reach,” Netanyahu warned.
Iran has said Nasrallah’s killing would bring about Israel’s “destruction”, though the foreign ministry said Monday that Tehran would not deploy any fighters to confront Israel.
Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati called for a ceasefire based on a recent US-French proposal, urging “an end to the Israeli aggression against Lebanon”.
US President Joe Biden, whose country is Israel’s main weapons supplier, on Monday indicated he opposes an Israeli ground operation.
“We should have a ceasefire now,” he said.
Most of Israel’s strikes have targeted Hezbollah strongholds in eastern and southern Lebanon and the southern suburbs of Beirut, the group’s main bastion.
On Monday, an Israeli strike hit a building in central Beirut, with an armed Palestinian group saying it had killed three of its members.
The strike, the first in the city centre in years, sparked panic, with 41-year-old resident Mohammed al-Hoss saying “the kids were in shock” after his house was damaged.
“Our country is in a wretched state. They (Israel) finished with Gaza and they have come to Lebanon,” he said.
Another resident, 42-year-old Kahier Bannout, said central Beirut was “supposed to be a safe area — not a war zone”.
“Everyone is afraid.”
In Israel’s north, too, some feared a wider war.
“Nasrallah was responsible for the deaths of many Israelis, so it is good news” that he was killed, said Matan Sofer, 24, in the town of Rosh Pina.
But “we don’t know when this is going to end,” he said of the violence.
Lebanon’s health ministry said six rescuers affiliated with Hezbollah were killed in an Israeli strike Monday.
Hamas said its leader in Lebanon, Fatah Sharif Abu al-Amine, was killed along with his wife and two children in a strike on Al-Bass refugee camp in south Lebanon. The Israeli military confirmed it had “eliminated” Sharif.