Ukraine launches drone attack on Moscow: Officials
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(MOSCOW) — In what is one of the largest drone attacks since the Russia-Ukraine war began, Moscow officials said they shot down at least 12 drones on Wendesday.
The Air Defense Forces of the Ministry of Defense shot down 10 UAVs Tuesday night and two more Wednesday morning, local time, according to Moscow Mayor Sergey Sobyanin.
It was not clear how many drones and missiles were launched in total.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
White House National Security spokesman John Kirby said on ABC News’ “This Week” that Hezbollah’s command structure has been “nearly decimated” and that thousands of the terrorist group’s drones and missiles have been destroyed.
Kirby’s remarks come after the Israel Defense Forces confirmed on Saturday that it had killed Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah in a strike on Beirut on Friday.
“There’s no question that the Hezbollah of today is not the Hezbollah that was even just a week ago,” Kirby told ABC’s Martha Raddatz.
But Hezbollah will likely regroup, Kirby warned, saying that “somebody will be anointed” to take Nasrallah’s place in command of the organization.
When asked about what capabilities remain for Hezbollah — whether the group still has long-range missiles and other firepower — Kirby said the U.S. does not have a “clear picture” of their capabilities.
“You can’t just count them out,” Kirby said. “They still have quite a bit of capability left.”
Kirby also warned that the U.S. has to “be ready” for Iran to respond to the Israeli attack that killed Nasrallah and other leaders, saying that Iran’s rhetoric “certainly suggests they’re going to try to do something.”
“We’re watching this very, very closely to see how — if and how — Hezbollah and or Iran may react as well as the militia groups in Iraq and Syria. We have to be prepared for some sort of response. We have to make sure that we are ready, and we are. We believe we have the force capability we need in the region, but it’s not clear right now, it’s too soon to know how Iran’s going to react to this,” Kirby said.
Kirby’s comments come as the U.S. beefs up military posture in the region. Earlier this week, the Pentagon confirmed that it moved a “small number” of additional U.S. military personnel to the Middle East.
President Joe Biden said in a statement on Saturday that he directed the Department of Defense “to further enhance the defense posture of U.S. military forces in the Middle East region to deter aggression and reduce the risk of a broader regional war.” Raddatz pressed Kirby on what the president meant by that.
“We did deploy some additional forces into the region. I would tell you that there’s other options available as well in terms of adding and enhancing that force posture,” Kirby said.
Kirby added that the U.S. has been growing its capacity in the region, even more than when Iran launched a missile and drone attack on Israel in April.
“So there is already a very robust military capability to defend ourselves and to help defend Israel, if it comes to that,” Kirby said.
Raddatz also asked Kirby about whether the administration was having conversations with Israel about how their actions could lead to U.S. assets becoming targets. Kirby said that the Israelis “understand” that the U.S. could become targets of attacks.
“I think they understand that, and we’re having those discussions with them right now about sort of what is the next best step, or steps forward, at the same time, as the president said yesterday, we got to make sure we’ve got the ability to defend our troops and our facilities, if it comes to that, and we believe we do,” Kirby said.
ABC News’ Luis Martinez contributed to this report.
Smoke billows from the site of an Israeli airstrike on the outskirts of the southern village of Habbouch on September 23, 2024. (Photo by RABIH DAHER/AFP via Getty Images)
(LONDON) — The Israeli military expanded its Lebanon campaign with hundreds of airstrikes on Monday, as the long-simmering border conflict with Hezbollah threatened to explode into a larger war.
Dozens of Israeli warplanes struck more than 1,300 targets in southern Lebanon on Monday morning, according to the Israel Defense Forces.
At least 492 people were killed and more than 1,600 wounded in the ongoing strikes, among them women, children and medical personnel, the Lebanon Ministry of Public Health said. Of those killed, 35 were children and 58 were women, the ministry said.
Israel also said it launched a targeted strike in Beirut. At least six people were injured in that airstrike on a residential building in Bir al-Abd, a southern suburb of Beirut, according to Lebanese state media.
Hezbollah officials said senior commander Ali Karaki — who Israeli sources confirmed was the target of the Beirut strike — survived the attack.
In a statement, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed Israel was changing “the security balance, the balance of power in the North.”
“For those who have not yet understood, I want to clarify Israel’s policy — we do not wait for a threat, we anticipate it,” Netanyahu said. “Everywhere, in every arena, at any time. We eliminate senior officials, eliminate terrorists, eliminate missiles — and our hands are bent.”
“Whoever tries to hurt us, we hurt him even more,” he added.
The attacks coincided with a warning by from IDF spokesperson Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari of more planned Israeli strikes against Hezbollah “terrorist infrastructure” in the border region and elsewhere.
Hagari said civilians in Lebanese villages used by Hezbollah for military purposes should “immediately move out of harm’s way for their own safety.”
Video and photos showed bumper-to-bumper traffic as people tried to flee southern cities.
Following the intense strikes in the south of the country on Monday morning, Hagari said the IDF would soon start hitting targets in the eastern Bekaa Valley — another Hezbollah stronghold. Hagari claimed that every house by Israeli munitions contained “rockets, missiles, UAVs that are intended to kill Israeli civilians.”
Hezbollah returned fire across the border with dozens of projectiles, the IDF said, with alarms sounding across the region. Some munitions were intercepted and some fell in open areas, the force wrote on social media.
There were about 250 launches from Lebanon into Israel on Monday, according to Israeli Emergency Officials. Hagari said there had been about 700 launches in the last week.
Israel’s Magen David Adom emergency service reported at least one man injured by shrapnel in the Lower Galilee area and another lightly hurt while making his way to a shelter.
Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said in a social media post that Israel “will act with full force” to change the current situation in southern Lebanon.
Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, Katz said, “has taken the people of Lebanon hostage, placing missiles and weapons in their homes and villages to threaten Israel’s civilians.”
“This is a clear war crime,” Katz said. “We will not accept this reality.”
“The people of Lebanon must evacuate any home turned into a Hezbollah outpost to avoid harm,” Katz continued. “We will not stop until the threat is removed from Israel’s citizens and the residents of the north return safely to their homes.”
Thousands of Lebanese cell phone users received a text message from the IDF on Monday, warning: “If you are in a building where Hezbollah weapons are located, stay away from the village until further notice.” Similar messages were issued over Lebanese radio.
The fresh Israeli warnings come after a weekend of intense cross-border fire, with rockets, missiles and drones launched into Israel by Hezbollah met by Israeli airstrikes across southern Lebanon.
Fighting between the IDF and Hezbollah has been constant since Oct. 8, when the Iranian-backed militant group began attacks into Israel in protest of the Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip targeting Hamas. Hezbollah has said it will continue its attacks until Israeli forces withdraw from the Palestinian territory.
Tens of thousands of Israelis fled border regions under Hezbollah fire since the fighting began. Their return is a priority for Netanyahu and his government.
“We will take whatever action is necessary to restore security and to bring our people safe back to their homes,” Netanyahu said on Sunday.
Israeli leaders are also demanding that Hezbollah withdraw beyond the Litani River — some 18 miles north of the Israeli border — as stipulated in a 2006 United Nations Security Council resolution that sought to end the last major cross-border war.
“If the world does not withdraw Hezbollah north of Litani in accordance with Resolution 1701 — Israel will do so,” Katz said on Sunday.
The conflict intensified last week with Israel’s detonation of Hezbollah communication devices in Lebanon and Syria, which Nasrallah described as an “unprecedented blow” for the group.
Two consecutive days of explosions — which killed at least 37 people and wounded 2,931, according to Lebanese Health Minister Firass Abiad — were followed by the killing of Hezbollah operations chief Ibrahim Aqil and 14 other members in a Beirut airstrike.
The bombing in the Hezbollah-aligned Dahiya suburb killed at least 45 people, according to the Lebanese Health Ministry. The dead included at least three children — aged 4, 6 and 10 — and seven women, the ministry said. Dozens more people were wounded.
Hezbollah leaders said they would continue their operations despite last week’s setbacks.
Deputy Secretary General Naim Qasem spoke at Aqil’s funeral in Beirut on Sunday, telling hundreds of mourners that the conflict has now entered “a new phase” which he called an “open-ended battle of reckoning”.
“Threats won’t stop us, and we don’t fear the most dangerous possibilities,” he continued. “We are ready to face all military scenarios.”
Israeli communities in the north of the country are braced for further escalation. The IDF issued new security guidance on Sunday closing schools and beaches in the region, while the Rambam Hospital in Haifa transferred patients to an underground facility.
This weekend, the State Department reissued its level 4 “do not travel” warning for Lebanon, noting “recent explosions throughout Lebanon, including Beirut.”
The Department’s July warning for American citizens to “depart Lebanon while commercial options still remain available” is unchanged. “At this time, commercial flights are available, but at reduced capacity,” the advisory said.
“If the security situation worsens, commercial options to depart may become unavailable.”
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin “reaffirmed the United States’ commitment to Israel’s right to defend itself and stressed the importance of achieving a diplomatic solution to return citizens to their homes in the north” in a Sunday phone call with Israeli counterpart Yoav Gallant, per a Pentagon readout.
Austin also “emphasized his concern for the safety and security of U.S. citizens in the region,” the Pentagon said.
ABC News’ Dana Savir, Ghazi Balkiz, Joe Simonetti and Morgan Winsor contributed to this report.
The late Lisa Marie Presley‘s posthumously released memoir, From Here to the Great Unknown, reveals that Michael Jackson told her he was a virgin when they started dating.
According to People, Presley says in the book that she was still married to first husband Danny Keough when Jackson professed his love to her.
“Michael said, ‘I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I’m completely in love with you. I want us to get married and for you to have my children,’” Presley writes. “I didn’t say anything immediately, but then I said, ‘I’m really flattered, I can’t even talk.’ By then, I felt I was in love with him too.”
The pair got together in 1994 after she split from Keough. She was 25 and Jackson was 35; Presley writes that at the beginning of their relationship, “He told me he was still a virgin. I think he had kissed Tatum O’Neal, and he’d had a thing with Brooke Shields, which hadn’t been physical apart from a kiss. He said Madonna had tried to hook up with him once, too, but nothing happened.”
She adds, “I was terrified because I didn’t want to make the wrong move.”
Jackson and Presley married in May 1994, but separated in December 1995, with their divorce finalized in August 1996. Presley married Nicolas Cage in March 2001, with Cage filing for divorce in November 2002. She married Michael Lockwood in January 2006 and had twins with him; she filed for divorce in 2016.
Presley died in January 2023.
Jackson went on to marry Debbie Rowe, the mother of two of his children, in 1996. They divorced in 2000. He died in 2009.
