A Rocket Killed 12 Youths On Israel-Controlled Land. Could That Spark A Regional War?

TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — The Middle East braced for a potential flare-up in violence on Sunday after Israeli authorities said a rocket from Lebanon struck a soccer field in the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights, killing 12 children and teens in what the military called the deadliest attack on civilians since Oct. 7. It raised fears of a broader regional war between Israel and Hezbollah, which in a rare move denied it was responsible.

Overnight, the Israeli military said it struck a number of targets inside Lebanon, though their intensity was similar to months of cross-border fighting between Israel and the Iranian-backed Hezbollah. Hezbollah said it also carried out strikes. There were no immediate reports of casualties.

Saturday’s attack came at a sensitive time. Israel and Hamas are negotiating a cease-fire proposal to end the nearly 10-month war in Gaza.

Here is a look at the broader repercussions:

On Saturday, a rocket slammed into a soccer pitch where dozens of children and teens were playing in the Druze town of Majdal Shams, about 12 kilometers (7 miles) south of Lebanon and next to the Syrian border. Twelve youth were killed and 20 others wounded, according to the Israeli military. One 11-year-old child was missing, residents told Israeli media.

“I feel darkness inside and out. Nothing like this happened here,” resident Anan Abu Saleh said. “There’s no way to explain this. I saw children, I don’t want to say what I saw, but it’s horrible, really horrible. We need more security.” On Sunday, the coffins passed through a crowd of thousands.

The Druze are a religious sect that began as an offshoot of Shiite Islam. There are Druze communities in Israel, Syria, and Lebanon. There are about 140,000 Druze in Israel, 25,000 in the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights, according to Yusri Hazran of the Hebrew University.

The Druze are considered among Israel’s most loyal citizens, although those in the Golan Heights have a more fraught relationship with authorities. Israel captured the Golan, a strategic plateau, from Syria in the 1967 Mideast war and annexed it in 1981. Much of the international community considers the area to be occupied territory. While Druze leaders in the Golan profess allegiance to Syria, relations with Israel are normally good.

The attacks on the Israel-Lebanon border have simmered below the threshold of all-out war since the start of the conflict in Gaza in October. But the deadly toll of Saturday’s attack, and the victims’ young age, could push Israel to respond more severely.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who hurried home from America after the strike, warned that Hezbollah “will pay a heavy price for this attack, one that it has not paid so far.” Israeli military’s Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi said a Falaq rocket with a 53-kilogram warhead that belonged to Hezbollah was fired.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Sunday that “every indication” showed the rocket came from Hezbollah. He said Israel had a right to defend itself but the U.S. didn’t want the conflict to escalate.

Hezbollah began firing rockets at Israel the day after Hamas’ attack on Oct. 7. Israel has responded by targeting what it says is Hezbollah’s military infrastructure with airstrikes and drones. Most attacks have been confined to border areas, though Israel has assassinated Hezbollah and Hamas leadership farther north in Lebanon. Tens of thousands of people on both sides of the border have evacuated.

Since early October, Israeli airstrikes in Lebanon have killed more than 500 people, mostly Hezbollah members but also around 90 civilians. On the Israeli side, 22 soldiers and 24 civilians have been killed.

Hezbollah has far superior firepower to Hamas. Igniting a war in Israel’s north while it’s engaged in Gaza would overburden the military, Barak Ben-Zur, a researcher at the International Institute of Counter-Terrorism, told journalists: “We are not, let’s say, capable to do it in both places and at the same time.”

Ben-Zur said the tragedy in Majdal Shams is a statistical inevitability with the Iron Dome missile defense system: If Hezbollah or other groups launch enough rockets and missiles, some will get through.

In Lebanon, some prepared for more fire from Israel. Lebanon’s national airline announced it had postponed the Beirut arrival of seven flights until Monday morning, without saying why.

“I doubt that there will be a strike, but nothing is far-fetched when it comes to the enemy,” said Abdallah Dalal, a resident of the Lebanese border village of Chebaa. Israeli officials have said the rocket that hit Majdal Shams was fired from nearby.

Any conflict could bring in Iran, which on Sunday warned Israel that a strong reaction to the Golan Heights strike will lead to “unprecedented consequences.” Iran and Israel’s yearslong shadow war burst into the open in April, when Iran launched 300 missiles and drones at Israel, most of which were intercepted, in response to the killing of an Iranian general.

An Egyptian official said the attack in the Golan Heights could give urgency to negotiations to reach a cease-fire deal in Gaza.

“Both fronts are connected,” he said. “A cease-fire in Gaza will lead to a cease-fire with Hezbollah.” The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to discuss the sensitive talks with the media.

In a statement, the Egyptian foreign ministry called on all influential international players to “intervene immediately to spare the peoples of the region further disastrous consequences of the expansion of the conflict.”

Officials from the United States, Egypt and Qatar were meeting Sunday with Israeli officials in Rome in the latest push for a cease-fire deal.

Magdy reported from Cairo. Associated Press writers Matt Lee in Tokyo, Kareem Chehayeb in Beirut and Sam McNeil in Sderot, Israel, contributed.