10 Syrians killed in Israeli strike

BEIRUT:

The Lebanese health ministry said an Israeli air strike on the south on Saturday killed 10 Syrians, as the Israeli military reported hitting weapons stores of the Iran-backed Hezbollah movement.

The death toll from the strike in the Wadi al-Kafur area of Nabatieh is one of the heaviest since Hezbollah began exchanging near-daily cross-border fire with Israeli forces after the Gaza war erupted last October.

Egyptian, Qatari and US mediators have been trying to broker a ceasefire in the war between Israel and Palestinian militant group Hamas, which diplomats say could help to avert a wider war in which Lebanon would be on the front line.

The dead in the latest strike included "a woman and her two children," the health ministry said in a statement.

A source close to Hezbollah in the Nabatieh area told AFP they were all civilians.

The Israeli military said the air force had struck a Hezbollah weapons storage facility overnight "in the area of Nabatieh", some 12 kilometres (seven and a half miles) from the Israeli border.

Hezbollah said it responded with a volley of Katyusha rockets on Ayelet HaShahar, a community in northern Israel.

The Israeli military said there were no reports of any casualties but the 55 rockets sparked "multiple fires".