Israel on Tuesday targeted the historic port city of Tyre in southern Lebanon, killing at least eight people, in an escalation that further strains efforts to broker a peace deal to end a wider war in the Middle East.
On Monday, Israel and Iran said they would halt mutual attacks after US President Donald Trump's appeal to end the first direct exchange of fire since April, but Tehran warned it would resume hostilities if Israel continued to attack its ally Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Tuesday's attacks were the deadliest in Tyre since the outbreak of conflict in Lebanon in early March, when Hezbollah fired rockets at Israel in support of Tehran, after Israel and the United States launched a war against Iran.
Israel had ordered the evacuation of the city earlier on Tuesday. Residents fled, and civil defense teams were transporting elderly residents to temporary shelters, state media reported. Eight victims were killed in a single attack on the eastern outskirts of the city, the Lebanese Health Ministry said.
Video footage verified by Reuters shows debris strewn across the road at the scene of the attack.
Israel's campaign in Lebanon complicates Trump's quest for peace
Israel's refusal to end its campaign in Lebanon, as Iran demands, has hampered Trump's efforts to turn a fragile truce in the broader US-Israeli war with Iran into a lasting agreement, according to Reuters.
While the ceasefire, announced on April 8, is largely holding in the Gulf War, Trump said two US helicopter crew members were "fine" after being rescued by a US Navy drone after their Apache attack helicopter crashed near the Iranian-controlled Strait of Hormuz.
It was not clear whether the Apache was shot down by Iranian fire, suffered a mechanical failure or faced some other problem. Asked if he knew what caused the helicopter to crash near Oman, Trump said a report would be released later Tuesday.
A US Navy surface drone found and rescued two crew members, the US military told Reuters. The US Central Command said the AH-64 Apache crashed at around 3am on Tuesday, or 2300 GMT on Monday.
"The pilots are fine," Trump said, speaking on the tarmac at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York, before returning to Washington. "No one was injured."
Central Command was more cautious in its statement, stating that the two crew members were pulled out within about two hours and were in stable condition.
Funeral of Iranian air defense personnel
A funeral was planned for Tuesday afternoon in Tehran for two members of Iran's air defense forces who were killed in Israeli strikes the previous day, the Iranian military said. No deaths have been reported in Israel since the Iranian strikes.
Oil prices LCOc1, which had risen during the exchange of fire between Israel and Iran, fell on Tuesday after the attacks were called off. O/R
Trump told reporters he could have an "idea" for a deal with Iran within days, without giving details. The Republican president, who faces record low approval ratings ahead of November's congressional elections, has often hinted at an imminent deal with Tehran, but it has so far failed to materialize.
US and Israeli officials said Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke on Monday.
In an interview with Axios, Trump said he warned the Israeli leader not to go back to war with Iran: "I said, 'Bibi, you better be careful, or you're going to be on your own very soon.'"
However, Israeli Army Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir said on Tuesday that the attack Israel carried out against Iran the previous day was "preparation for a much more significant and powerful strike."
"We are ready to come back and deal another serious and deep blow to Iran," he said during a visit to military exercises in northern Israel.
Tehran has long argued that any peace deal with the US depends in part on ending the fighting in Lebanon, which Israel invaded in March, pursuing Hezbollah fighters who had been firing across the border.
In northern Israel on Tuesday, Israeli troops operating in the Ramim Ridge area, near the border with Lebanon, killed one person in an incident in which they returned fire, the army said.
Israel has never suspended its campaign in Lebanon, which has killed thousands of people, arguing that the conflict should be treated separately from any US-Iranian ceasefire. Hezbollah has also continued its attacks.
At the same time, Tehran continued to block most shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of the world's crude oil and liquefied natural gas passed before the war. Washington imposed its own blockade of Iranian ports.
US Energy Secretary Chris Wright said on Tuesday that shipping traffic through Hormuz was increasing “very significantly,” but added that it would take many months for energy flows to return to normal after the war ends.
Trump has said any peace deal must guarantee that Iran cannot develop nuclear weapons. Iran's demands include the lifting of international sanctions, the release of billions of dollars in frozen assets and recognition of its control over the strait.
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