Updated March 28, 2025 at 11:56 AM ET
TEL AVIV, Israel — The Israeli military launched a strike on suburban Beirut Friday, the first time it has struck Lebanon's capital city area since it reached a November 2024 ceasefire with the militant group Hezbollah.
Israel said it was targeting a building in the Dahiyeh suburb used by Hezbollah to store drones, after early morning rockets were fired from southern Lebanon toward northern Israel.
The Iran-backed Lebanese militant group denied Friday's rocket fire, as well as a previous attack on March 22, and said it was committed to the ceasefire. No other group has claimed responsibility.
"We will not allow any fire on our communities, not even a trickle," Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a statement. "We will continue to enforce the ceasefire with strength, strike anywhere in Lebanon against any threat to the State of Israel, and ensure that all our residents in the north return to their homes safely."
The Israeli military warned residents to evacuate Dahiyeh, especially the Hadath neighborhood, prior to the strike, showing a map with the location of the target.
Between the evacuation warning and the attack, Umm Abbas, 60, told NPR by phone from Hadath: "There's panic. There are two schools nearby filled with kids. People are screaming left and right, people are crying."
Soon, news images showed plumes of smoke rising from Beirut's southern suburbs.
There were no immediate reports of casualties there. Lebanese officials have reported 18 people killed in southern Lebanon by Israeli drone, air and artillery strikes over the past week.
United Nations peacekeepers tell NPR they have tallied thousands of ceasefire violations, most of them by Israel.
The fighting comes after Israel broke a separate ceasefire with Hamas, renewing its military offensive in the Gaza Strip that started after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack on Israel.
Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, who was visiting Paris at the time, declared the government's "strong condemnation" of the return of Israeli strikes, and of any "malicious attempt to drag Lebanon back into the cycle of violence." He said it increased Lebanon's determination "to build our state and our army."
French President Emmanuel Macron said the strikes were a "violation of the ceasefire agreement" and they "play into Hezbollah's hands." He called on Israeli forces to withdraw from southern Lebanon and allow Lebanon's army to deploy there and civilians to return.
Alex Leff reported from Tel Aviv, Lauren Frayer and Jawad Rizkallah from Damascus. Yanal Jabarin contributed reporting from Jerusalem.
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