The Israel Defense Forces has confirmed at least four fatalities and seven “severely injured” among its personnel in a Hezbollah UAV attack on an army base in Binyamina on Sunday. Israeli media outlets previously reported more than 60 injuries in the area, but refrained from unveiling the target of the attack.
The armed group announced an attack on a Golani Brigade camp in Binyamina with a “swarm of drones” earlier on Sunday. The area is located to the south of Haifa, which has been a frequent target of Hezbollah strikes in recent weeks.
“A UAV launched by the Hezbollah terrorist organization hit an army base adjacent to Binyamina,” the IDF confirmed early Monday. “Four IDF soldiers were killed in the incident and an additional seven were severely injured.”
The drone made it past Israeli air defenses and struck the base at around seven in the evening, IDF spokesperson Daniel Hagari said in a statement. The military is investigating how an unmanned aerial vehicle could have passed air defenses undetected, he added.
Initial Israeli media reports spoke of 67 wounded in a Hezbollah drone strike in the Binyamina area on Sunday. Israeli military censorship prohibits sharing images or videos of the results of these sort of strikes. However, unconfirmed videos circulating on social media appear to show a canteen with a damaged roof and multiple blood stains on the floor.
Last week, American journalist Jeremy Loffredo was arrested in the West Bank for reporting on the aftermath of the recent Iranian strike on Israel. Loffredo reportedly faces court for “aiding the enemy during wartime and providing information to the enemy.”
While Hezbollah and Israel have routinely exchanged strikes over the past year, the Jewish state stepped up its military campaign against the Lebanese armed group last month. West Jerusalem launched a massive bombing and limited ground campaign against Lebanon, after a series of hand-held electronics explosions killed dozens and wounded thousands of people across the country, in an attack widely believed to have been orchestrated by Israel.
While the IDF has publicly acknowledged that around two dozen of its soldiers have been killed in Lebanon, Hezbollah maintains that the true scale of the Israeli death toll is far greater.