LEBANON’S Health Ministry said today that the death toll from Israeli air strikes in Lebanon since early Monday has reached 558, including 50 children and 94 women.

Health Minister Firass Abiad said that 1,835 people were wounded during the same period and were taken to 54 hospitals around Lebanon.

Mr Abiad added that four paramedics were among those killed, and at least 16 paramedics and firefighters were wounded.

This came as Israel and Hezbollah continued to trade strikes on Tuesday, including fresh strikes on Beirut, after Monday’s massive Israeli bombardment killed nearly 500 people, sent thousands fleeing from southern Lebanon and put the two sides on the brink of all-out war.

Displaced families slept in shelters hastily set up in schools in Beirut and the coastal city of Sidon. With hotels quickly booked to capacity or rooms priced beyond the means of many families, those who did not find shelter slept in their cars, in parks or along the seaside.

Well-wishers offered up empty apartments or rooms in their houses in social media posts, while volunteers set up a kitchen at an empty gas station in Beirut to cook meals for the displaced.

In the eastern city of Baalbek, the National News Agency reported that lines formed at bakeries and gas stations as residents rushed to stock up on essential supplies in anticipation of further air strikes.

Hezbollah said that it launched missiles overnight at eight sites in Israel, including an explosives factory in Zichron, 37 miles from the border.

Admitting another failure of the famed Iron Dome defence system, the Israeli military said that 55 rockets were fired from Lebanon into northern Israel, setting fires and damaging buildings. 

Military officials said that they carried out dozens of air strikes on Hezbollah targets.

The renewed exchange came after Monday’s historic barrages racked up the highest death toll in any single day in Lebanon since Israel and Hezbollah fought a bruising war in 2006.

The sides appear on the verge of war again after tensions have steadily escalated over the last 11 months. Hezbollah has been firing rockets, missiles and drones into northern Israel in solidarity with the Palestinians and its ally Hamas in Gaza.

Israel has responded with increasingly heavy air strikes and the targeted killing of Hezbollah commanders while threatening a wider operation.

Israel has vowed to do whatever it takes to ensure that its citizens can return to their homes in the north, while Hezbollah has said it will keep up its rocket attacks until there is a ceasefire in Gaza, which appears increasingly remote.