Israel-Hamas war latest: Israeli soldiers are wounded amid Hezbollah strikes as wider war feared

At least 19 people including six soldiers were wounded in northern Israel on Tuesday after Lebanon’s Hezbollah militants launched drone attacks, emergency officials said, as world leaders try to stop tensions in the Middle East from boiling over into a regional war.

Most of the people were hurt by an Israeli interceptor rocket that missed and hit the ground. Local authorities issued sweeping new guidelines in northern Israel for all residents to “avoid all non-vital activity and to stay near a safe area” until further notice. Israel and Hezbollah have exchanged near-daily strikes for the past 10 months during the war in Gaza.

In the occupied West Bank, Israeli fire during military raids killed 10 Palestinians, including four teenagers, and wounded another 10, Palestinian officials said.

Efforts continue around the region to prevent the war from becoming a wider conflict after the killings last week of a senior Hezbollah commander in Lebanon and Hamas’ top political leader in Iran. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told his Cabinet over the weekend that Israel is already in a “multi-front war” with Iran and its proxies.

Inside Gaza, the only corridor for humanitarian aid to enter the south has been shut down because of fighting in the area. The Palestinian territory faces a severe humanitarian crisis as its Health Ministry says the death toll in the war approaches 40,000.

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Here’s the latest:

At least 19 hurt in northern Israel after Hezbollah launches drone strikes

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AP AUDIO: Israel-Hamas war latest: Palestinians killed in West Bank as world leaders try to avoid regional war

AP correspondent Charles de Ledesma reports on a further protest by Ultra-Orthodox Jewish men against their impending army call up.

NAHARIYA, Israel — At least 19 people including six soldiers have been wounded in northern Israel after Lebanon’s Hezbollah militants launched drone attacks, emergency officials said. Most were hurt by an Israeli interceptor rocket that missed and hit the ground.

The attack did not appear to be linked to Hezbollah’s vow to avenge the killing of one of its top commanders in an Israeli airstrike in Beirut last week, which has raised fears of an all-out war. Still, local authorities issued sweeping new guidelines in northern Israel for all residents to “avoid all non-vital activity and to stay near a safe area” until further notice.

Tuesday’s strikes appeared to be part of the near-daily exchanges of fire across the Israeli-Lebanon border. Hezbollah says its rocket and drone barrages since the start of the war in Gaza are an act of solidarity with the Palestinians.

An Israeli airstrike earlier Tuesday killed four people in southern Lebanon, according to Lebanese authorities.

Hezbollah’s drones targeted sites near the coastal town of Nahariya, the military said. It said an interceptor missed its target in one case, falling and injuring a number of people. The Nahariya Medical Center said 12 people were hurt in that incident, including one seriously. Seven others were injured in another drone strike, the center said.

Hezbollah said it targeted Israeli army bases after an Israeli strike Monday killed a lower-level commander in southern Lebanon.

Ultra-Orthodox protesters enter Israeli military base, objecting to draft order

JERUSALEM — Ultra-Orthodox protesters have jumped barriers and broken through fences to storm an Israeli military recruitment base in another demonstration against their impending enlistment.

A landmark Supreme Court order said young religious men must begin enlisting for military service. Under long-standing political arrangements, ultra-Orthodox men had been exempt from the draft that is compulsory for most Jewish men.

In videos aired on Hebrew media, at least a dozen men could be seen wandering through the woods at the base. Others could be seen scuffling with police on horseback. Israeli police said 21 people were arrested and three policemen were injured. The military condemned the violent behavior and called the enlistment of ultra-Orthodox “an operational necessity.”

Hezbollah launches drone attack in northern Israel, wounding at least 7

NAHARIYA, Israel — Lebanon’s Hezbollah launched a drone attack Tuesday on northern Israel, wounding at least seven people, in response to the killing of one of its fighters in an Israeli airstrike.

The attack did not appear to be linked to Hezbollah’s vow to avenge the killing of one of its top commanders in an Israeli airstrike in Beirut the previous week, which has raised fears of an all-out war.

Hezbollah has launched near-daily drone and rocket attacks since the start of the Gaza war in what it says is an act of solidarity with the Palestinians. Israel has responded with airstrikes, one of which killed four people in southern Lebanon earlier Tuesday, according to Lebanese authorities.

Hezbollah said it launched a drone attack targeting army bases in northern Israel in retaliation for the killing of a lower-level commander in a strike late Monday.

Gal Zaid, spokesperson for Galilee Medical Center, said it was treating one severely wounded person and four others with mild injuries. Israel’s Magen David Adom rescue service said it was treating seven wounded in three locations in Western Galilee.

The Israeli military said “a number” of drones entered from Lebanon, one of which was intercepted. It said several civilians were wounded near the coastal town of Nahariya, some 6 kilometers (4 miles) south of the border, without giving a precise number.

The only humanitarian air corridor into southern Gaza is shut down

JERUSALEM — The only corridor for humanitarian aid to enter southern Gaza has been shut down, apparently because of fighting in the area.

The Israeli military said the humanitarian route leading from the crossing into the city of Rafah was closed Tuesday until further notice after anti-tank missiles were fired at troops and multiple soldiers were wounded. It said the Kerem Shalom crossing was open.

Hamas’ armed wing said it attacked an Israeli tank in the area. It is not possible to confirm battlefield reports in Gaza.

The Palestinian territory has been plunged into a severe humanitarian crisis in the war ignited by Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack into Israel. The vast majority of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million have been displaced by the fighting, often multiple times, and hundreds of thousands are sheltering in crowded, squalid tent camps. International experts said in June that Gaza was at “high risk” of famine.

Aid groups say efforts to bring in desperately needed food and supplies have been hindered by Israeli restrictions, ongoing fighting and the breakdown of law and order.

An Israeli strike on a village in south Lebanon kills 4, Health Ministry says

BEIRUT — Lebanon’s Health Ministry says an Israeli airstrike on a village in the country’s south killed four people. The ministry said Tuesday’s airstrike targeted a home in the village of Maifadoun near the market town of Nabatiye.

It was not immediately clear if the dead were civilians or militants.

Since early October, Hezbollah began attacking Israeli military posts along the border calling it a backup front for their Palestinian allies in the Gaza Strip. Since then, more than 500 people have been killed in Lebanon, including around 90 civilians. On the Israeli side, 22 soldiers and 24 civilians have been killed.

An Israeli officer is stabbed on the outskirts of Jerusalem, Israeli police say

JERUSALEM — Israeli police say a stabbing at a checkpoint on the outskirts of Jerusalem lightly wounded one Border Police officer.

Police said that the attack occurred after Israeli officers at the checkpoint asked passengers to disembark from a bus for what it called a “routine check.” One of the passengers then stabbed a Border Police officer with a screwdriver.

Military Police immediately shot and killed the attacker, police said without identifying the assailant. Israel’s rescue services said the 20-year-old female officer wounded in the attack was fully conscious and was being transferred to the hospital.

Violence has surged in the occupied West Bank since Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack triggered the war in Gaza. More than 600 Palestinians have been killed, mostly in military raids, gun battles between the army and militants, and violent protests. Palestinians have carried out a number of attacks against Israelis, including stabbings at checkpoints.

10 Palestinians are killed and 10 wounded in Israeli raids in the West Bank

RAMALLAH, West Bank — Palestinian officials say 10 Palestinians were killed, including four teenagers, and another 10 were wounded by Israeli fire during military raids and operations across the north of the occupied West Bank.

The Palestinian Health Ministry said Tuesday that four people, including two 19-year-olds and a 14-year-old, were killed in an overnight raid in the village of Aqaaba in the northern West Bank. It said another four people, including an 18-year-old, were killed in an Israeli strike on a vehicle in Jenin — a frequent flashpoint — where the Islamic Jihad militant group said its fighters were battling the army.

Meanwhile two more Palestinians were shot dead by Israeli forces in the village of Kafr Qud, near Jenin, later Tuesday, the ministry said.

Israel’s military said it “eliminated four terrorists” with an airstrike in the Jenin area and that it and border police “eliminated” seven others it said threw explosive devices at security forces or tried to plant explosives. It said a soldier was injured during the operation.

Israel has carried out near-daily military raids across the West Bank since Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack. Palestinians from the West Bank have carried out a number of attacks on Israelis. The Health Ministry says over 600 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire in the West Bank since the start of the war. Most were killed during military arrest raids and violent protests.

Israel captured the West Bank, along with Gaza and east Jerusalem, in the 1967 Mideast war. The Palestinians want all three territories for their future state. The 3 million Palestinians in the West Bank live under seemingly open-ended Israeli military rule, with the Western-backed Palestinian Authority exercising limited control over population centers. Over 500,000 Jewish settlers, who live in scores of settlements across the territory that most of the international community views as illegal or illegitimate, have Israeli citizenship.

Australia’s prime minister condemns Iranian ambassador’s comments on social media as ‘abhorrent’

SYDNEY — Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese on Tuesday condemned as “abhorrent” an Iranian ambassador’s social media comment on Israel.

Albanese said ambassador Ahmad Sadeghi had been called in for a meeting with Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade officials over his recent post on the social media platform X.

Sadeghi cites Hamas spiritual leader Ahmed Yassin advocating that “wiping out the Zionist plague out of the holy lands of Palestine happens no later than 2027.” Sadeghi added: “Looking forward to such a heavenly & divine promise Inshaa-Allah.” The Arabic expression means “if God wills.”

Albanese told reporters: “I make it clear: There’s no place for the sort of comments that were made online on social media by the Iranian ambassador.”

“They’re abhorrent. And they are hateful, they are antisemitic and they have no place,” Albanese added.

Asked by a reporters if the ambassador should be expelled from Australia, Albanese did not directly answer.

The Iranian Embassy in Australia later told The Associated Press in an email that Sadeghi’s post “has nothing to do with Jewish People, anti-Semitism or raising hate speech or violent ways.”