At least five family members were killed in an Israeli strike in south Lebanon, official media said on Thursday in an updated toll, adding one boy was pulled alive from the rubble.
The raid late Wednesday in the southern city of Nabatiyeh resulted in the highest civilian death toll in a single strike in Lebanon since cross-border hostilities began in October, raising fears of a broader conflict between Israel and militant group Hezbollah.
A total of 10 people were killed in Israeli raids across southern Lebanon on Wednesday, eight of them civilians, official media and Hezbollah said.
The state-run National News Agency said on Thursday that “five bodies were pulled out” of the wreckage of a flat in Nabatiyeh, identifying them as apartment owner Hussein Barwaji, his two daughters, his sister and his grandson.
It had previously reported four dead.
Barwaji’s wife and niece’s “bodies” were unaccounted for, the NNA said.
Emergency responders managed to pull a boy alive from the rubble “after midnight”, it added, while another relative and at least six other people were taken to hospital.
The agency said the Israeli strike, carried out by “a drone with a guided missile”, caused severe damage to the three-storey apartment building, warning it could collapse and reporting damage to nearby buildings, vehicles and infrastructure.
