By Tala Ramadan
DUBAI (Reuters) – Two people were seriously wounded when Hezbollah fired dozens of rockets into the Golan Heights on Tuesday, Israel’s ambulance service said, as the Lebanese militant group retaliated after a former bodyguard of its leader was killed in an Israeli strike.
Israel’s ambulance service said in a statement that paramedics reported two casualties “in critical condition” after red alert sirens sounded in the Israeli-occupied Golan. The Israeli military has not confirmed the casualties.
Earlier in the day, an Israeli airstrike hit a vehicle on the Damascus-Beirut highway in Syrian territory, killing a Hezbollah leader. Sayyed Hassan Nasrallahformer bodyguards of, who security sources say were recently involved in transporting weapons for the Iran-backed group.
Hezbollah said it had fired dozens of Katyusha rockets into the Golan Heights in retaliation. The Israeli military said 40 projectiles had entered the Golan Heights from Lebanon.
Hezbollah mourned former bodyguard Yasser Nimr Qarnabsh without elaborating on his role in the organization. Two security sources said he had become a mid-ranking Hezbollah official involved in transporting weapons.
Israel does not usually discuss attacks by its forces in Syria. When asked about the strike, an Israeli military spokesman said: “We do not comment on foreign media reports.”
Hezbollah began firing on Israeli targets along the border in support of the Palestinians after its ally Hamas launched an attack on Israel on October 7 that sparked the war in Gaza. Tens of thousands of Israelis and Lebanese have been forced to evacuate from areas around the border between the two countries.
(Reporting by Laila Bassam, Timour Azhari, Tala Ramadan, Steven Scheer and Hatem Maher; Editing by Peter Graff and Mark Heinrich)
