The attacks by an Iran-aligned group come as Israel anticipates an Iranian response to an airstrike on its Syrian consulate.
Hezbollah said it fired “dozens of rockets” at Israeli artillery positions in response to attacks by the Israeli military in southern Lebanon, in one of its biggest attacks since the start of the war on Gaza.
The Iran-aligned Lebanese armed group confirmed in a statement late Friday that it had fired dozens of Katyusha rockets at “enemy artillery positions” in northern Israel and the occupied Golan Heights.
The rockets set off sirens in several communities in the Upper Galilee in northern Israel, with anti-aircraft missiles battling the incoming projectiles.
The Israeli military said: “40 launches were identified from Lebanese territory, some of which were intercepted. The rest fell in open areas.”
“This is a huge number of missiles and drones, one of the largest attacks of the war so far on Gaza,” Al Jazeera’s Rory Challands said, reporting from occupied East Jerusalem.
“No injuries were reported,” the Israeli military said, adding that it had previously intercepted two Hezbollah drones loaded with explosives that crossed into Israeli territory from Lebanon late Friday.
Hezbollah, an ally of the Palestinian group Hamas, and Israeli forces have engaged in almost daily firefights across the border since the war in Gaza began on October 7. The group has stated that it will cease its attacks on Israel once a ceasefire is reached in Gaza.
While the attacks have remained largely confined to border regions, their frequency and intensity have raised fears of a wider conflict.
Al Jazeera’s Ali Hashem, reporting from Tire in southern Lebanon, said the current regional context makes Hezbollah’s launches important, but location is also important.
“Hitting the Golan in this confrontation was nothing normal,” he said.
Hashem said this shows “how the rules of engagement in this confrontation are changing drastically,” with attacks increasingly injuring civilians and also military targets, killing more than 60 Lebanese civilians, compared to several on the Israeli side.
As tensions rose, Israel launched at least five air strikes on Saturday in southeastern Lebanon, an area that is one of Hezbollah’s strongholds, Hashem reported.
Israeli warplanes targeted a large Hezbollah “military compound,” the air force said on Saturday.
Hezbollah’s latest attack comes as the world expects an Iranian attack on Israel in retaliation for an airstrike on the Iranian consulate in Syria that killed seven members of its forces, including two generals assigned to operations in Lebanon and were responsible in Syria.
The Israeli military has said it is prepared for an Iranian attack. Foreign Minister Israel Katz warned Iran that if Israel uses its own territory for attacks, it will also attack inside Iran.
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said Israel is ready to defend itself on the ground and in the air in close cooperation with “our partners,” i.e. the United States.
“The situation is escalating by the minute and everyone is awaiting the next step,” Hashem said.