At least 274 people killed by Israeli airstrikes in Lebanon

Israel unleashed its most widespread wave of airstrikes against hundreds of Hezbollah targets on Monday, killing at least 274 people by Lebanese tallies, and warned citizens to evacuate areas where it said the armed group was storing weapons.

The latest attacks come after some of the heaviest cross-border exchanges of fire in almost a year of conflict, as Israel shifts its focus to its northern border, where Hezbollah has been firing rockets into Israel in support of its ally Hamas, which is fighting a war with Israel in Gaza.

On Monday evening, an Israeli strike on Beirut's southern suburbs targeted senior Hezbollah leader Ali Karaki, the head of the southern front, but his fate was unclear, a security source told Reuters.

Earlier, Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said the campaign would continue until "we achieve our goal to return the northern residents safely to their homes". Hezbollah for its part has vowed to fight on until there is a ceasefire in Gaza.

Lebanon's health minister said 274 people had been killed, including 21 children and 39 women, and 1,024 wounded. One Lebanese official said it was Lebanon's highest daily death toll from violence since the 1975-1990 civil war.

The Israeli military said it had struck about 800 targets connected to Hezbollah in southern Lebanon and the Bekaa valley.

In response to the strikes, Hezbollah said it had launched dozens of missiles at a military base in northern Israel.

Sirens warning of Hezbollah rocket fire sounded across northern Israel, including in the port city of Haifa, and in the northern part of the occupied West Bank, the military said.

The latest Israeli airstrikes have intensified pressure on Hezbollah, which last week suffered an attack its Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah called “unprecedented in the history” of the group, after thousands of pagers and walkie-talkies used by its members exploded.