HAIFA, March 12 — Flashes of fire tore through the night sky over Haifa as a volley of projectiles streaked toward northern Israel from across the Lebanese border.
Caught in the open street, an AFP team witnessed the rocket fire alongside residents, who usually rush for shelter when sirens wail across the city.
It was around 8 pm yesterday, darkness had already settled over the sprawling Mediterranean port, whose terraced neighbourhoods climb from the shoreline to the northern slopes of Mount Carmel.
Haifa is known for its mix of Jewish and Arab communities. The city also hosts sensitive strategic infrastructure, including an oil refinery and a naval base.
Muslim families were finishing iftar, the meal that breaks the Ramadan fast, while the trendy restaurants in the city were serving their last dinners.
On the 12th day of the Middle East war, nighttime activity had noticeably thinned in Haifa.
Located roughly 30 kilometres (20 miles) from the Lebanese border, Haifa has also regularly been targeted by rockets fired by Hezbollah, the Iran-backed Shia movement and a sworn enemy of Israel.
Hezbollah launched attacks on Israel in support of its sponsors in Tehran, opening a new front in the conflict after Israel the United States launched a massive campaign against the Islamic republic.
Israel launched strikes on Hezbollah strongholds and targets in Lebanon in retaliation, and ground forces are currently conducting operations in border areas.
Hundreds of thousands of Lebanese have fled their homes, and strikes have expanded beyond the vague confines of Hezbollah’s traditional strongholds.
Back in Haifa, several orange flashes ripped through the night sky without warning, immediately sending passersby scrambling for cover.
Dull explosions echoed overhead, rattling windows and reverberating through the area.
Their precise origin was impossible to determine, but the patterns suggested that interceptor missiles from Israel’s Iron Dome air-defence system were being launched, streaking vertically upward toward incoming projectiles.
Moments later, the piercing wail of air-raid sirens shattered the night-time silence.
‘Considerable fire’
While Israel’s detection systems are highly effective at identifying missiles launched from Iran, they do not always provide advance warning of rockets or drones fired by Hezbollah from nearby Lebanon.
The last diners seated at outdoor terraces hurried indoors, and the AFP team took refuge in a vaulted stone cellar dating back to the Mamluk era.
Waiters watched the sky cautiously from the doorway as though it might offer some protection from falling shrapnel.
From Ben-Gurion Avenue, lined with trees and restaurants, it was difficult to determine the nature of the rocket fire.
Only one thing was clear from the trajectory: the attack had come from the north, from Lebanon.
According to a military estimate cited by defence correspondents from several Israeli media outlets, Hezbollah fired approximately 100 rockets toward northern Israel yesterday evening at 8 pm, launching them from multiple locations in Lebanon.
Emergency services reported that two people were treated for injuries.
Haifa has frequently been targeted since the start of the war, caught in crossfire from both Lebanon and Iran.
Such scenes illustrate the daily reality of the war—repeated salvos and air-raid alerts, day and night, affecting millions of Israelis in the country’s north and around Tel Aviv, areas particularly exposed to attack.
They also highlight the challenges of reporting on the war from within Israel.
While social media is flooded with many manipulated images, the publication of such scenes remains subject to Israel’s strict military censorship.
The army notably refuses to release statistics on the geographic distribution of strikes or their exact number.
“Over the past 24 hours, and especially in the last few hours, the rocket fire toward Israel from Iran and from Hezbollah in Lebanon has continued,” Israeli army spokesman Brigadier General Effie Defrin said late Wednesday.
Urging the public once again to follow safety instructions and move into protected spaces, he acknowledged that in recent days there had been “considerable fire—both from Hezbollah in the north and from Iran”.
The majority of the projectiles, he said, had been intercepted. — AFP
