Israeli strikes hit Beirut amid threats on Iranian officials in Lebanon 

Israeli strikes have hit the southern suburbs of the Lebanese capital, Beirut, state-run media have said, as Israel’s deadline for Iranian officials to leave Lebanon expired, as it bombards the south and entrenches troops on the ground across the border, a volatile front in the wider regional war.

The Lebanese National News Agency on Thursday reported several strikes in the early morning hours on the southern Beirut neighbourhoods of Ghobeiry and Haret Hreik. There were no immediate reports of casualties.

Israel’s military had earlier issued forced displacement orders for the suburbs where the strikes were reported, warning it was about to hit what it said were targets linked to Hezbollah.

It said targets included a facility used by the group’s aerial units, without providing evidence.

Israel on Wednesday gave Iran’s representatives in Lebanon 24 hours to leave the country. That deadline has since expired.

Al Jazeera’s Heidi Pett, reporting from Beirut, said “the Iranians seem to believe that this is a threat against their embassy and are threatening any Israeli embassy if their mission is struck”.

Human Rights Watch called the threats deeply concerning, saying this signals an intent to commit a war crime, as people who are not directly involved in hostilities cannot be targeted under international law.

Pett said gunfire could be heard throughout the night in the Lebanese capital as residents shot in the air to warn of imminent Israeli strikes.

Forced evacuation warnings “come in the middle of the night, and the city’s residents are not usually glued to X in the middle of the night,” the reporter said.

“So locally, when people become aware of these warnings, they start firing in the air throughout the southern suburbs of Beirut to warn people that the Israeli military has issued an imminent threat to their homes and lives.”

In Lebanon’s south, Israeli strikes were reported in the al-Shahabiya district of Tyre. Our colleagues at Al Jazeera Arabic also reported Israeli air attacks on the city of Nabatieh. There were no immediate reports on casualties from those strikes.

Hezbollah on Wednesday said its fighters were engaged in armed confrontations with advancing Israeli troops in the town of Dahira in the far south of Lebanon. The group has also been carrying out aerial attacks in northern Israel.

This comes as Israeli ground troops continued to push deeper into Lebanon in a ground offensive north of the Israeli-Lebanese border, with the declared intent of creating a buffer zone and pushing back Hezbollah.

The army on Thursday issued another evacuation threat for residents of southern Lebanon, warning them to “continue evacuating to the north of the Litani River”.

“Anyone present near Hezbollah elements, facilities, or combat means endangers their life,” it said. “Any home used by Hezbollah for military purposes may be subject to targeting.”

Al Jazeera’s Rory Challands, reporting from Amman, said “the fear among the Lebanese is that whatever the Israeli military is doing in southern Lebanon is not temporary and that it could be a more long-term holding of territory, or something more akin to an invasion”.

A strike was also reported in northern Lebanon in the Beddawi refugee camp, close to the city of Tripoli, far from where the majority of Israeli attacks on Lebanon have taken place.

Lebanon’s Ministry of Public Health said the attack killed at least two people.

Local sources in the Palestinian refugee camp told Al Jazeera a Hamas official was killed in the attack, which appeared to be a targeted assassination.

About 75 people have already been killed in Israeli attacks in Lebanon since Monday, with more than 400 wounded and tens of thousands displaced.

Israeli forces on Wednesday bombed the Comfort Hotel on the border of Hazmieh and Baabda, which are part of greater Beirut. An Israeli strike in Baalbek, close to the Syrian border, killed at least five people.