Zamir vows IDF to stay in south Lebanon until threat removed

4 injured, 4 feared trapped under rubble in Iranian missile strike on Haifa building

One person in serious condition as rescue services search for 4 missing others, including elderly people and a child; 6 lightly hurt as Hezbollah rocket hits Deir al-Asad

Four people were injured, including one seriously, after an Iranian ballistic missile struck a residential building in Haifa on Sunday, as northern Israel faced near-constant missile and drone attacks from both Tehran and its Lebanese terror proxy Hezbollah.

Four people were reported missing after the strike, believed to be trapped under the rubble, first responders said, adding that firefighters and IDF Home Front Command personnel were searching for the missing people.

A Fire and Rescue Service official at the scene said that among the missing were two elderly people and a child.

According to Magen David Adom emergency services, medics treated an 82-year-old man who was seriously injured in the missile strike, along with three others who were lightly injured by the blast and by shrapnel.

Four others were treated for acute anxiety, MDA added.

According to the fire service, the building that sustained a direct hit was at “serious” risk of collapse after a fire erupted at the scene. The fire service added that it was carrying out scans “under complex conditions due to the possibility of trapped individuals.”

At the scene, Israel Police Commissioner Danny Levy told reporters that rescue teams “are focusing all efforts on the four… who are supposed to be here, using all means at our disposal.”

Levy also said that the warhead of the ballistic missile that struck the residential building may not have exploded upon impact, “and therefore we evacuated several buildings, so that, in the unlikely case that the missile explodes, nobody will be hurt.”

“Our sappers are handling the matter,” he added.

After the missile strike, the Israeli Air Force said it was investigating the failure to shoot down the Iranian ballistic missile, which it said carried a conventional warhead, not a cluster bomb.

Attempts to intercept the missile were made, but air defenses failed to knock the projectile down, the military said.

At the same time as the Iranian missile attack on Haifa, Hezbollah stepped up its rocket and drone attacks on northern Israel, with sirens sounding across the north several times on Sunday.

One drone launched by the Iran-backed terror group struck a home in the northern community of Shomrat, causing damage but no injuries, according to rescue services.

In the nearby town of Deir al-Asad, six people were lightly injured after a Hezbollah rocket struck the town, medics said, adding that several others were treated for acute anxiety.

Several other drones and rockets launched by Hezbollah at the north were intercepted throughout Sunday, the IDF said.

Since joining Iran in its fight against Israel last month, Hezbollah has been firing hundreds of rockets a day, according to the IDF. The vast majority of the daily rocket fire has been directed at Israeli forces operating in southern Lebanon, with several dozen projectiles crossing the border into Israel.

The group has also fired some 165 rockets at United Nations posts in southern Lebanon since joining the fray, the IDF said Sunday, two days after a Hezbollah rocket struck a UN Interim Force in Lebanon base in Odaisseh, wounding three members of the observer force, including two seriously, according to Israel. UNIFIL did not comment on the origin of the blast.

Three UNIFIL troops of Indonesian origin have been killed in recent weeks, two of them in a roadside blast that Israel blamed on Hezbollah. The third was killed by apparent Israeli tank fire.

Zamir vows to stay in south Lebanon

While visiting the northern border city of Nahariya, IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir vowed to the mayor that the military will not leave southern Lebanon until the threat of Hezbollah is removed.

“We hold the area and will not leave it until the direct threat to you is removed. This is at the top of our priority list,” Zamir was quoted as saying by the IDF.

Later, while visiting Israeli troops stationed in southern Lebanon, Zamir said that the ongoing ground offensive against Hezbollah in southern Lebanon will advance Israel’s goal of disarming the terror group, but that there also need to be “moves led by the political echelon.”

“Regarding the war objectives at this time in Lebanon, the IDF is establishing a forward defensive line to strengthen defense and push the threat away from northern communities. We will remain on this line as long as required,” he said of the IDF’s planned buffer zone.

Zamir added that the IDF is working to “suppress and reduce” rocket fire from Lebanon, but “this will take time.”

“The objective of disarming Hezbollah is defined as a supreme goal; this is an ongoing objective that existed before the current campaign. The current campaign will advance it,” he said, adding that the military will advance this objective “based on the IDF’s operational achievements and through moves led by the political echelon.”

Eleven IDF soldiers have been killed in southern Lebanon during the fighting against Hezbollah, two civilians were killed by Hezbollah rockets, and an Israeli civilian was mistakenly killed in the north by Israeli artillery shelling.

In Lebanon, the Israeli military has said that it has killed some 1,000 Hezbollah operatives, including hundreds of members of the terror group’s elite Radwan Force, since hostilities escalated amid the war with Iran.

More than 3,500 Hezbollah targets in Lebanon have also been struck, including hundreds of command centers, weapon depots, and rocket and missile launchers, according to the IDF.