Israeli strikes killed at least four people in Lebanon on June 4, according to Lebanese authorities, as fighting continued despite a newly announced ceasefire arrangement between Israel and Lebanon. Hezbollah rejected that agreement and demanded that Israeli forces withdraw fully from Lebanese territory.
Lebanon’s state news service attributed one death and four injuries in southern Maaroub to an Israeli drone attack; the person killed had been riding a motorcycle. It also reported that an attack on Sohmor in the eastern Bekaa Valley killed three people and wounded others. The Israeli military said it had conducted operations near Tyre and Shaqra in southern Lebanon.
Israel’s military said its troops fatally shot a fighter before discovering a nearby Hezbollah store of firearms, grenades and surface-to-air missiles. The supplied account did not independently establish whether the motorcyclist identified by the Lebanese agency was the person Israel described as a militant.
The violence unfolded after the United States, Israel and Lebanon announced terms following a fourth round of talks in Washington. The arrangement required Hezbollah fire to stop and its personnel to leave territory south of the Litani River, about 30 kilometers, or 20 miles, above the Israel-Lebanon border. It also envisioned Lebanese army control and pilot security areas from which Hezbollah would be excluded.
Hezbollah leader Naim Kassem rejected those requirements in a televised statement, saying withdrawal under fire would amount to defeat. He called instead for an end to Israeli attacks and a complete Israeli pullout. Hezbollah had not committed to end its own fire.
Drone alerts later sounded in northern Israel, including Shlomi, after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had met local officials there. Israel’s military said attempts to intercept several drones triggered the alarms and that the drones landed near troops in southern Lebanon without causing injuries.
Other combat deaths underscored the agreement’s fragility. A Serbian member of the UNIFIL peacekeeping mission died and two colleagues were wounded when a mortar hit their position near Marjayoun. Israel blamed Hezbollah without providing evidence; the United Nations and Hezbollah did not immediately assign responsibility. Israel also announced that a 21-year-old armored-corps captain had been killed in combat in southern Lebanon.
Lebanese troops entered Dibbine with UNIFIL coordination after Israeli forces left, the first reported Israeli withdrawal from a southern location since the latest war began roughly three months earlier. At the reporting point, diplomacy had produced terms between governments but not consent from Hezbollah, and active strikes continued to cause deaths in both southern and eastern Lebanon.
The four Lebanese fatalities were reported by location rather than through a single consolidated incident. Their identities were not supplied, and the account did not state whether the three people killed in Sohmor had been warned before the attack.
