Israel vowed Sunday to strike Hezbollah again if threatened, after its forces carried out some of their deadliest attacks in southern Lebanon since a U.S.-mediated framework was agreed in June, killing at least 11 people, including children, according to Lebanese authorities.

The Israeli military said the strikes were carried out in response to Hezbollah launching explosive drones inside what Israel calls a security zone in southern Lebanon, seriously wounding three Israeli soldiers, including an officer.

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said Israel would respond forcefully to any further attacks.

“No score will be left unsettled in any arena. We'll defend our soldiers and our civilians with full power,” Katz wrote on X.

The Israeli military said the strikes had targeted Hezbollah infrastructure and a senior commander involved in attacks against Israeli troops.

The military initially identified one of those killed as Ali Samir Al-Haj Hassan, whom it described as a commander in Hezbollah’s elite Radwan Force. It later identified another slain figure as Abu Hassan Alaa, saying he was a senior commander in Hezbollah’s Badr unit who had been involved in launching drones at Israeli troops.

The military said Hassan was killed when Israeli aircraft struck what it described as a central headquarters of the Radwan Force in the southern village of Ansar.

It acknowledged that Hassan’s family was also inside the building at the time, but said they were not the target.

Lebanese authorities gave a far different account of the casualties.

Lebanon’s official National News Agency said seven people were killed when Israeli warplanes struck a house in Ansar, including three children and two women. Four more people were killed in a separate strike on the village of Deir El Zahrani, it said.

The attacks wounded 19 people in total, according to the agency.

Lebanese President Joseph Aoun said an entire family had been killed in the Ansar strike and described the attacks as a “clear message” directed at negotiations and U.S. efforts to implement the framework agreement between Lebanon and Israel.

Prime Minister Nawaf Salam rejected Israel’s characterization of the site struck in Ansar as military infrastructure.

“The martyrs of the Israeli raid on the village of Ansar are not ‘military infrastructure’ and the women and children killed in it are not military targets,” Salam said on X.

The United Nations also condemned the civilian deaths.

“Children and civilians continue to pay an unacceptable price. International humanitarian law is clear: civilians must be protected at all times,” Imran Riza, the U.N. humanitarian coordinator for Lebanon, said.

Israel, Hezbollah Trade Blame

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office accused Hezbollah of violating the ceasefire and deliberately exposing civilians to danger by using them as cover for military activity.

“The IDF responded by striking the Hezbollah terror headquarters which ordered the attack,” Netanyahu’s office said in a statement on X. “Only later did the IDF learn that Hezbollah deliberately put civilians in that military compound.”

Hezbollah rejected the accusation, saying another family had been killed as a result of orders issued by Netanyahu.

In a statement, the Iran-backed group accused the Israeli prime minister of presiding over the killing of Lebanese civilians, while referring to proceedings against Netanyahu before the International Criminal Court over alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.

Hezbollah said the Israeli attacks would be met with an appropriate response.

The Israeli strikes came amid a fragile U.S.-backed framework under which Lebanon’s army is expected to gradually assume responsibility for security in southern areas currently occupied by Israeli forces.

Hezbollah, however, has rejected demands that it surrender its weapons, leaving a major obstacle to implementation of the agreement.

The framework allows Israeli forces to remain in occupied areas of southern Lebanon until Hezbollah is disarmed and the Lebanese army assumes control, terms the group has rejected as tantamount to surrender.

A U.S. State Department official has said that a permanent Israeli military presence in southern Lebanon would not be consistent with Israel’s commitments under the agreement.

Israel Says It Will Not Withdraw Until Hezbollah Is Disarmed

Israel seized large areas of southern Lebanon during fighting earlier this year after Hezbollah opened fire on Israel in support of Iran, following U.S.-Israeli strikes that triggered a wider regional war in late February.

Hezbollah drew Lebanon into the conflict on March 2 by firing rockets toward Israel, saying it was acting in support of Iran.

At least 4,300 people have been killed in Lebanon since March 2, according to figures cited by Lebanese authorities.

Israel has repeatedly said it intends to retain control of parts of southern Lebanon to prevent further attacks on communities in northern Israel.

During a visit to southern Lebanon on Thursday, Katz said Israel would not withdraw its forces from areas under its control until Hezbollah had been disarmed.

On Sunday, he again warned that Israel would respond to any threat from the group.

The latest strikes underscore the widening gap between Israel and Hezbollah over the terms of the ceasefire framework, particularly the question of Hezbollah’s weapons and the future of Israeli forces in southern Lebanon.

Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, a political ally of Hezbollah who has played a central role in negotiations, called for national unity and urged the sponsors of the ceasefire and peace talks to take responsibility for stopping the conflict before it was too late.

Strikes Deepen Pressure on Negotiations

The Israeli attacks also struck areas beyond the immediate border zone.

The National News Agency reported Israeli airstrikes across southern Lebanon, including against Ali al-Taher hill, a strategically important area north of the Litani River.

One strike on a valley near Ansar was described as the deepest Israeli attack inside Lebanon in two months.

Aoun said the latest escalation was a “clear message” aimed at the negotiations and U.S. efforts to implement the framework agreement.

The Israeli side, meanwhile, argued that the strikes could reinforce rather than undermine the talks.

Doron Spielman, an international spokesman for the Israeli prime minister’s office, told Reuters that the attacks would “tighten up” negotiations.

“I think it should make the negotiations more serious and more real, because it highlights the whole reason we got into these negotiations in the first place,” he said.