Thomson Reuters

· Posted: May 26, 2026 4:58 AM EDT | Last Updated: 2 hours ago

Israel is "deepening its operations in Lebanon," Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Tuesday, while it remained unclear if a potential ceasefire deal with Iran would bring the fighting between Israel and Hezbollah to a halt.

The Israeli military "is operating with large forces in the field and capturing controlling areas," Netanyahu said in a statement. "We are fortifying the security strip to protect the northern communities."

Netanyahu's announcement came as Israel's military clashed with the Iran-backed militant Hezbollah along the Litani River, which has been a de facto boundary in Lebanon.

Tuesday's intensified strikes and clashes came after Netanyahu said he had authorized more intensive strikes targeting Hezbollah across Lebanon.

Israel's military said it struck more than 100 Hezbollah sites across southern Lebanon and the eastern Bekaa Valley area overnight, saying it targeted storage facilities, command centres and observation points used to attack Israeli troops and residents in northern Israel.

One strike hit the eastern village of Mashghara, killing 12 people including several members of a family, Lebanon's state-run National News Agency said.

WATCH | Israeli military hits ambulance drivers in Lebanon:

Israel in recent days has intensified strikes in Nabatieh city and province, just north of the river. On Tuesday it warned city residents to leave.

Hezbollah meanwhile said it launched several rocket, artillery and exploding drone attacks on Israeli troops and vehicles mobilizing along the river toward the Nabatieh villages of Yohmor al-Shaqif and Zawtar al-Sharqieh.

Hezbollah's Al-Manar TV said the militant group repelled attacks along the river banks.

Since the ceasefire, the Lebanese capital of Beirut has been spared from strikes, but Israel's latest moves have caused fear.

"By just saying a few words on TV, [Netanyahu] causes everyone to panic and flee their homes," said Tony Aboud in Beirut's bustling Hamra district. "I don't know what's going to happen and how long we can live like this."

The Israeli military expanded its ground operations in southern Lebanon beyond a demarcation line that Israel set up several kilometres inside Lebanese territory after the April 16 ceasefire, two sources told Reuters on Tuesday.

The sources gave no further details on the extent of the advance beyond the so-called yellow line.

The line, separate from the United Nations-demarcated "Blue Line" marking the frontier between Lebanon and Israel after Israel's withdrawal in 2000, forms part of a proposed buffer zone extending five to 10 kilometres into southern Lebanon.

Lebanon seeks Israeli withdrawal

The Lebanese government, which came to power on a platform of reform and disarming Hezbollah and other armed groups, hopes that the direct talks with Israel, opposed by Hezbollah, will lead to a permanent ceasefire and withdrawal of Israeli troops.

Israel says it will not withdraw until Hezbollah no longer poses a threat to residents of its northern towns.

Hezbollah has vowed to continue fighting until Israel stops its daily airstrikes and withdraws its troops from Lebanon.

In recent weeks, Hezbollah has boasted that it is using new fibre-optic drones that Israeli troops have struggled to intercept, hitting both Israeli forces and northern Israeli villages. 

Lebanese civil defence workers search through the rubble of a building following an Israeli strike at dawn in the southern Lebanese area of al-Hosh, near the coastal city of Tyre on Tuesday. (AFP/Getty Images)

Israel has told people there not to gather in large numbers.

"What this requires of us now is to increase the blows, to increase the intensity. We will smite them hip and thigh," Netanyahu said Monday.

Over a million people in Lebanon have been displaced by the war, sparked when Hezbollah fired rockets into northern Israel on March 2 in solidarity with Iran, two days after the Iran war began. 

Lebanon's Health Ministry says the cumulative toll from the Israeli offensive since March 2 had reached 3,213 dead and 9,737 wounded.

The World Health Organization has said at least 608 people in Lebanon have been killed in Israeli attacks since the truce. 

The Israeli military said that 10 of its soldiers had been killed since the April 16 ceasefire, six of them by Hezbollah's explosive drones.