Israel-Lebanon latest: Israel strikes central Beirut as Biden fears Iran attack over Hezbollah chief’s death

The deputy chief of Lebanon’s armed group Hezbollah is due to give an address imminently, the group’s media office have said.

It is the first address by a Hezbollah official since the killing of the group’s secretary general in an Israeli air attack on Friday.

The media office originally reported the speech would take place at 12 pm local time, 9am GMT.

White House national security spokesperson John Kirby said that Israel’s airstrikes in Lebanon have “nearly decimated” Hezbollah’s command structure, though he cautioned that the group will likely rebuild it swiftly.

He told ABC: “There’s no question that the Hezbollah of today is not the Hezbollah that was even just a week ago.”

But he warned that “somebody will be anointed” to take Hassan Nasrallah’s place.

Israel confirmed that the Hezbollah leader was killed in a strike on Beirut on Friday.

“We’re watching this very, very closely to see how, if and how, Hezbollah and / or Iran may react as well as the militia groups in Iraq and Syria. We have to be prepared for some sort of response. We have to make sure that we are ready, and we are. We believe we have the force capability we need in the region, but it’s not clear right now, it’s too soon to know how Iran’s going to react to this,” Mr Kirby said.

Smoke is rising from Beirut’s southern suburbs after a suspected Israeli strike, witness have told Reuters.

Lebanese media have suggsted the smoke this is the result of the collapse of a building, rather than an airstrike.

Palestinian militant group Hamas said an Israeli strike killed its leader in Lebanon on Monday, while another Palestinian militant group said three of its leaders were killed in a strike on Beirut, the first attack within the city limits.

Hamas said its leader in Lebanon, Fateh Sherif Abu el-Amin was killed, along with his wife, son, and daughter, in a strike that targeted their house in a Palestinian refugee camp in the southern city of Tyre in the early hours of Monday.

As Israel escalates hostilities against Iran’s allies in the region, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) said three of its leaders were killed in a strike that targeted Beirut’s Kola district.

The strike hit the upper floor of an apartment building, Reuters witnesses said.

Hassan Nasrallah’s death is not only an enormous blow to Hezbollah but also to Iran, whose Revolutionary Guards founded the group in 1982.

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Pope Francis suggested Sunday that Israel‘s attacks in Gaza and Lebanon have been “immoral” and disproportionate, saying its military domination has gone beyond the rules of war.

Francis was asked en route home from Belgium about Israel’s targeted killing of one of Hezbollah’s founding members, Hassan Nasrallah. Friday’s strike in Beirut targeted an area greater than a city block and reduced several residential buildings to rubble, and at least six other deaths have been confirmed.

Francis didn’t mention Israel by name and said he was speaking in general terms. But he said that “the defense must always be proportionate to the attack.”

“When there is something disproportionate, there is a dominating tendency that goes beyond morality,” he said. “A country that does these things — and I’m talking about any country — in a superlative way, these are immoral actions.”

He said that even if war itself is immoral, there are rules that “indicate some morality.”

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The Israeli military says it has uncovered and dismantled a Hamas tunnel in central Gaza that was over a kilometre (0.6 miles) long.

It said the tunnel ran near homes, and that inside were several rooms and equipment used by militants for prolonged stays.

The military released footage showing the entrance to the tunnel, a long staircase leading down and what appeared to be an iron blast door.

Hamas is believed to have built hundreds of miles of tunnels across Gaza to evade Israeli airstrikes. The militants have also used the tunnels to hold hostages captured in the 7 October attack that triggered the war and to launch ambushes against Israeli forces.

Hamas’s top commander in Lebanon, Fateh Sherif Abu el-Amin, has been killed in an Israeli strike, the militant group confirmed on Monday.

Some of el-Amin’s family members were also killed during the airstrike in the south of the country.