ZOUK MOSBEH, Lebanon — The Israeli military hit bank branches across Lebanon overnight to target Hezbollah’s finances, expanding its offensive in an assault that sparked panic as the U.S. launched a new push for a diplomatic solution to the intensifying regional conflict.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken was set to travel to the Middle East on Monday for a trip that will focus on talks to end Israel’s conflict with Iran-backed militant groups in Lebanon and Gaza after the killing of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar — and amid mounting outrage over Israel's deadly renewed assault on the north of the Palestinian enclave, where the United Nations said life had been made "impossible."
But it also comes as Israel prepares an attack against Iran itself.
An advanced anti-missile system sent by the U.S. is now in place in Israel, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said early Monday, boosting its defenses while the U.S. investigates an apparent leak of top-secret documents showing U.S. spy agencies tracking possible Israeli preparations for the strike.
Israel targets bank branches across Lebanon
Hundreds of residents of Lebanon's capital and surrounding suburbs suddenly fled their homes Sunday night after the Israel Defense Forces issued a string of evacuation orders, with blasts ringing out shortly afterward.
IDF spokesman Daniel Hagari warned the evacuation orders for residents of Beirut and other areas of Lebanon were issued ahead of strikes targeting buildings he said were being "used to finance Hezbollah's terror activities."
Hagari did not name the institutions being targeted, but over the night a string of branches belonging to the Al-Qard Al-Hasan bank were hit in a volley of airstrikes. The U.S. and Israel have linked the bank to the Iran-backed militant and political group.
An NBC News crew in Beirut heard the blasts ring out as Lebanese national media reported strikes on bank branches in the city's southern suburbs. Video shared on social media and geolocated by NBC News showed buildings on fire and collapsing after apparent airstrikes.
U.N. Special Coordinator for Lebanon Jeanine Hennis described "widespread panic" across the country after the evacuation orders. In a post Sunday on X, she said there was only a "brief window to escape to safety" before "intense blasts" hit.
Beirut resident Wafaa Ezeldinne told NBC News, "I can’t describe the panic."
"Everybody was on the streets," she said after she fled her home before she returned hours later. "Even displaced people left locations that were close to Al-Qard Al-Hasan. Streets at night were jammed with cars, people."
Ranim Halawani, who works with the Development for People and Nature Association, or DPNA, in the coastal town of Saida, said she and others also fled their homes after they heard about the evacuation orders. In the end, she said, "we didn’t have an attack in Saida, but people were afraid, and they left." She said many had returned to their homes.
Al-Qard Al-Hasan, or AQAH, has been under U.S. sanctions since 2007, with the Treasury Department describing it as being used by Hezbollah "as a cover to manage the terrorist group's financial activities" and to "gain access to the international financial system."
Since then, Treasury officials have continued to accuse Hezbollah of using the bank to "abuse the Lebanese financial sector and drain Lebanon's financial resources at an already dire time" in a country grappling with protracted economic and political crises.
Al-Qard Al-Hasan, which translates to "the good loan," has more than 30 branches across Lebanon, according to local media, many based in the Shiite-majority southern suburbs of Beirut and at least some appearing to have been connected to residential buildings.
Israel's strikes on the bank marked an expansion of its war against Hezbollah beyond what the IDF has described as targeting the group's military sites.
The IDF said Monday that Israeli soldiers also continued to launch ground raids into southern Lebanon and had dismantled "large quantities of Hezbollah's weapons" while also killing Hezbollah members, including "tactical-level commanders."
At least 2,464 people, including 127 children, have been killed in Lebanon since hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah began to escalate last year following Hamas' Oct. 7 terrorist attack, according to the Lebanese health ministry, while an estimated 1.2 million people have been displaced from their homes.
In an interview with the Saudi state news channel Al Arabiya on Monday, Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati said that he believed there would be "no solution except through diplomacy" to end fighting in the region but that he'd had no direct contact with Hezbollah since the middle of last month.
Israeli military making life 'impossible' in northern Gaza, U.N. says
Meanwhile, Israeli forces continued a deadly offensive in northern Gaza, where dozens of people were killed over the weekend in Israeli airstrikes in the areas of Beit Lahia and the nearby Jabalia refugee camp, according to local health officials.
The IDF said Monday that troops had killed militants and continued to dismantle militant infrastructure and tunnel shafts in the area of the Jabalia refugee camp over the past day. The military said troops were also operating across southern and central Gaza.
The U.N. Human Rights Office said in a statement that it was "increasingly concerned that the manner in which the Israeli military is conducting hostilities in north Gaza" may be "causing the destruction of the Palestinian population in Gaza’s northernmost governate through death and displacement."
It said that particularly appeared to be the case in areas including Jabalia, Beit Lahia and Beit Hanoun.
Over the past two weeks, it said, "the Israeli military has taken measures that make life in north Gaza impossible for Palestinians while repeatedly ordering the displacement of the entire governorate."
Zoya Awky reported from Zouk Mosbeh and Chantal Da Silva from London.
