BEIRUT, May 14 (Xinhua) -- An Israeli balloon was shot down on Tuesday over the village of Rmeish in southern Lebanon, according to Hezbollah and Lebanese military sources.
Hezbollah said in a statement that after continuous tracking of the movement of the "spy" balloon and determining its location, the Hezbollah fighters targeted the balloon and destroyed it. As a rope tied the balloon to the Israeli site where the crew was positioned, Hezbollah also wounded and killed its management crew there.
A Lebanese military source told Xinhua that an Israeli balloon was spotted oscillating in the airspace of the northern Israeli region, but the direction of the winds reversed and moved it toward the Lebanese airspace, landing it in the vicinity of the border village of Rmeish in southern Lebanon.
The source added that members of the Lebanese army worked to dismantle the balloon and transferred it to one of its military sites.
According to the sources, Israel carried out ten airstrikes targeting eight towns and villages in the eastern and western sectors and fired about 50 shells toward 12 towns and villages in the border region of southern Lebanon.
They added that one of the raids also targeted the southwest village of Yaroun, destroying four homes and wounding four citizens who were transported to a hospital in the southern city of Tyre.
For its part, Hezbollah said its fighters targeted several Israeli sites.
Tensions along the Lebanon-Israel border escalated on Oct. 8, 2023, following a barrage of rockets launched by Hezbollah toward Israel in solidarity with Hamas' attack on Israel the day before. Israel then retaliated by firing heavy artillery toward southeastern Lebanon. ■
