Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced a change in operational directives to the IDF and Mossad, granting advance authorization to carry out targeted killings of senior Iranian and Hezbollah officials without prior political approval when time-sensitive intelligence emerges, according to Israel’s Channel 12 News.
The directive aims to prevent delays in the ongoing bombing campaign and follows last night’s targeted assassinations which killed senior Iranian officials Ali Larijani and Gholamreza Soleimani.
Netanyahu has repeatedly vowed that the operation against Iran will “create the conditions” for the Iranian people to rise up and topple the regime.
Hezbollah Fire
On Tuesday evening March 17, the IDF released a warning saying they had detected “increased preparations” by Hezbollah to launch rocket barrages in the coming hours.
Around 10:00 pm, local media reported that more than 70 rockets were fired into northern Israel with minimal reported damage.
Targeting Central Beirut
By early Wednesday March 18, the focus had shifted to Beirut with Reuters reporting Israeli strikes on Zuqaq al-Blat and Basta in central Beirut without evacuation orders.
Later an Israeli strike destroyed an entire building in Bachoura roughly 1 km from Lebanese Parliament. The strike followed an evacuation order posted on Israeli social media and had been previously targeted as a site of the Hezbollah-affliated financial institution Qard al-Hassan, according to local media.
Zuqaq al-Blat was later targeted again with two strikes targeting particular apartments in the morning of March 18, according to local media.
The Lebanese Health Ministry announced that 12 people died in the strikes, with 41 others wounded.
Operations in the South
Following the massive barrage overnight, the IDF announced that Division 36 had joined expanded ground activity in South Lebanon.
Local media reported continued attacks in the south, including Shabaa, Abbasiyeh, the Tyre–Housh road near an army barracks, Aitit, Zibqin, Qnarit, Ghandoorieh, the outskirts of Srifa, and an alerted building in Aaqbiyeh, alongside renewed evacuation warnings for villages south of the Zahrani.
Later, the IDF targeted a car on a road in Saida, in between the city’s Corniche and Zaatari Mosque.
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