AN ISRAELI air strike on central Beirut killed Hezbollah’s chief spokesman yesterday, an official with the group said. 

Earlier, Israeli strikes killed at least 12 people in the Gaza Strip, officials said, where Israel has waged a war against the Palestinians for over a year.

The latest in a series of assassinations of senior Hezbollah officials came as Lebanese officials were reportedly considering a United States-led ceasefire proposal. 

Israel also bombed several buildings in Beirut’s southern suburbs, where Hezbollah has long been headquartered.

Mohammed Afif, the head of media relations for Hezbollah, was killed in a strike on the Arab socialist Ba’ath party’s office in central Beirut, according to a Hezbollah official.

Mr Afif had remained especially visible after the eruption of all-out war between Israel and Hezbollah in September and the killing of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah. 

Eyewitnesses at the scene of Sunday’s strike saw four lifeless bodies and four wounded people, but there was no official word on the toll. 

There was no comment from the Israeli military.

“I was asleep and awoke from the sound of the strike, and people screaming, and cars and gunfire,” said Suheil Halabi, who witnessed the strike. “I was startled, honestly. This is the first time I have experienced it so close.”

Hezbollah began firing rockets, missiles and drones into Israel the day after Hamas’s October 7 2023, attack. 

Israel hit back with its own air strikes on Lebanon and the conflict steadily escalated, erupting into all-out war in September. Israeli forces invaded Lebanon on October 1.

Hezbollah has fired dozens of projectiles into Israel each day and has expanded their range to the central part of the country. A rocket barrage on the northern city of Haifa on Saturday damaged a synagogue and wounded two civilians.

Meanwhile, Israeli strikes killed six people in Nuseirat and another four in Bureij, two built-up refugee camps in central Gaza.

Another two people were killed in a strike on Gaza’s main north-south highway, according to the al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in the central city of Deir al-Balah, which received all 12 bodies.

Israeli police arrested three suspects on Saturday after flares were fired at Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s private residence in the coastal city of Caesarea.

Authorities say that Mr Netanyahu and his family were not at the residence when the flares were fired and there were no injuries.

A Hezbollah drone struck the residence last month.

The police did not provide details about the suspects behind the flares, but officials pointed to domestic political critics of Mr Netanyahu.