12 people died while arrests were made due to flares thrown at Netanyahu’s house during Israel’s attacks in Gaza – WSVN 7News | Miami News, Weather, Sports

TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — Palestinian health officials said Sunday that 12 people were killed in Israeli attacks on the Gaza Strip overnight. Meanwhile, Israeli police arrested three suspects after shots were opened at Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s private residence in the coastal city of Caesarea.

In Lebanon, Israeli warplanes struck the southern suburbs of Beirut after the army warned people to evacuate from several buildings.

The Hezbollah militant group has a strong presence in the region known as Dahiya, and the attacks came as Lebanese officials were considering a US-brokered ceasefire proposal. One of the attacks hit the center of Beirut for the first time in weeks.

Authorities said Netanyahu and his family were not at home when two flares were fired during the night and there were no injuries. Last month, while Netanyahu and his family were away, a drone launched by Hezbollah hit the residence.

Police did not provide detailed information about the suspects behind the flares, but officials pointed out domestic political critics of Netanyahu. Israel’s largely ceremonial president, Isaac Herzog, condemned the incident and warned against “escalation of violence in public spaces.”

Netanyahu has faced months of mass protests over his handling of the hostage crisis sparked by a Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, which sparked the ongoing war in Gaza.

Critics blame Netanyahu for security and intelligence failures that led to the attack and for failing to reach an agreement with Hamas to release the large number of hostages still held in Gaza. Israelis demonstrated once again in Tel Aviv on Saturday night, demanding a ceasefire agreement that would bring them back.

12 people killed in night attacks in central Gaza

Israeli strikes killed six people in Nuseyrat and four in Bureij, two refugee camps in central Gaza dating from the 1948 war surrounding Israel’s founding.

According to the Al Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in the city of Deir Al Balah, where all 12 bodies were found, two more people were killed in the attack on Gaza’s main north-south highway.

The war between Israel and Hamas began when Palestinian militants raided Israel on October 7, 2023, killing approximately 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and kidnapping 250 people. About 100 hostages remain in Gaza, and about a third of them are believed to be dead.

Gaza’s Ministry of Health says approximately 43,800 Palestinians have been killed in the war. The ministry does not distinguish between civilians and combatants but said more than half of the deaths were women and children. Nearly 90% of Gaza’s 2.3 million Palestinian population has been displaced, and large areas of the region have been leveled by Israeli bombardment and ground operations.

Israeli warplanes hit south of Beirut

The Israeli military issued evacuation warnings on X about an hour before the attacks in southern Beirut early Sunday. Local media reported that church bells were ringing in and around the area to warn residents. There were no immediate reports of casualties.

One of the attacks hit a building belonging to the Arab socialist Baath party in central Beirut. This was the first strike in the central part of the city in weeks. An Associated Press photographer at the scene saw four dead bodies and four injured people.

After the attack without any warning, people were seen running away from the neighborhood. The Israeli army has not yet made a statement about the attack.

The Israeli military also renewed its call on Sunday for residents of more than a dozen villages in southern Lebanon to flee as ground troops advance northward.

Hezbollah began firing rockets, missiles and drones at Israel the day after Hamas’ attack in 2023, and launched retaliatory airstrikes. The conflict gradually escalated and escalated into all-out war in September. Israeli forces invaded Lebanon on October 1.

Hezbollah continued to fire dozens of missiles into Israel every day and expanded its range into the central part of the country. Rocket bombardment of the northern city of Haifa on Saturday damaged a synagogue and injured two civilians.

More than 3,400 people have been killed in Lebanon and more than 1.2 million have been driven from their homes, according to the country’s Ministry of Health. It is not known how many of those killed were Hezbollah fighters.

On the Israeli side, Hezbollah’s airstrikes killed at least 76 people, including 31 soldiers, and caused nearly 60,000 people to flee northern communities.

Netanyahu ally wants to revive divisive plans to overhaul judiciary

Israeli Justice Minister Yariv Levin evaluated the flare attack on Netanyahu’s house and called for the revival of Netanyahu’s plans to overhaul the Israeli judiciary, which led to mass protests for months before the war.

“It is time to give full support to the restoration of the justice system and law enforcement, and to put an end to anarchy, attacks, denials and attempts to harm the prime minister,” he said in the statement.

Supporters said the judicial changes aim to strengthen democracy by limiting the powers of unelected judges and delegating more power to elected officials. Opponents see the overhaul as a seizure of power by Netanyahu, who is on trial over corruption charges and an attack on a key observer.

Many Israelis believe that the violent internal divisions caused by the attempted overhaul weakened the country and its military ahead of the Hamas offensive.

Opposition Leader Yair Lapid, in his post on the X channel, blasted Levin’s suggestion and said that he “strongly condemned” the firing of a flare at Netanyahu’s house.

“Levin should go home with the rest of this irresponsible government,” Lapid wrote. “We will not allow it to turn Israel into an undemocratic state.”

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