An Israeli drone strike on a car in eastern Lebanon killed two people Friday, Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency says. The strike came after Lebanon’s militant Hezbollah group carried out an attack along the border that killed an Israeli civilian.

The Israeli military said it targeted an official with Lebanon’s al-Jamaa al-Islamiya, or the Islamic Group, that is allied with Hezbollah. It has been active in predominantly Sunni Muslim villages along the Lebanon’s southern border with Israel.
The Israeli military said the man killed was Musab Khalaf. It says Khalaf was behind attacks on Israeli troops in the disputed Chebaa Farms that Israel captured from Syria during the 1967 Mideast war. The Lebanese government says the area belongs to Lebanon.
An official with al-Jamaa al-Islamiya refused to confirm NNA’s report when contacted by The Associated Press. The attack occurred on a road near the eastern village of Maydoun, NNA said without identifying the two killed.
The strike came a day after Hezbollah carried out an attack along the border that killed an Israeli civilian.
Hezbollah and Israel have traded fire on a near-daily basis along the border since the start of the war in Gaza nearly seven months ago. Hezbollah says it is acting in solidarity with the Palestinian militant group Hamas, whose deadly Oct. 7 attack into southern Israel triggered the war.

Hezbollah and Israel have traded fire on a near-daily basis along the border since the start of Israel-Hamas war nearly seven months ago.
Egypt sent a high-level delegation to Israel on Friday for talks seeking to push through a cease-fire agreement with Hamas and avert an Israeli offensive on the Gaza Strip city of Rafah, officials said.
More than half of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million have sought refuge in Rafah. The city is on the border with Egypt, which warned that a possible Israeli offensive focused on Rafah could have catastrophic consequences to regional stability.
The Israeli military has massed dozens of tanks and armored vehicles in the area in what appears to be preparations for an invasion of the city.
The Israel-Hamas war was sparked by the unprecedented Oct. 7 raid into southern Israel in which militants killed around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducted around 250 hostages. Israel says the militants are still holding around 100 hostages and the remains of more than 30 others.

Currently:

— Egypt sends delegation to Israel, its latest effort to broker a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas

— Private security company says missile fire seen off the Yemen coast in the Red Sea near crucial strait

— Premature baby girl rescued from her dead mother’s womb dies in Gaza after 5 days in an incubator

— PEN America cancels World Voices Festival amid criticism of its response to Israel-Hamas war

— Columbia University protesters say they’re at an impasse with administrators and will continue anti-war camp

— Students at prestigious Paris university occupy campus building in pro-Palestinian protest

Here is the latest:

DRONE ATTACK ON IRAQ GAS FIELD KILLS 4
BAGHDAD — A drone attack Friday on a gas field in the semi-autonomous Kurdish region of northern Iraq killed four Yemeni workers and wounded three others, the regional government said.
The government’s statement called it a “terrorist attack” without blaming a specific group. No group claimed responsibility.
The attack happened on the Khor Mor gas field in Sulaymaniyah. The regional government’s electricity ministry announced the suspension of gas production and a loss of 2,500 megawatts of power production.
A rocket attack on the same gas field in January caused infrastructure damage and widespread power outages. Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani ordered an investigation, but the government has not announced any results.
Friday’s attack followed a failed rocket strike that was launched from Iraq early this week toward a base housing U.S.-led coalition forces in Syria, an apparent resumption of attacks on U.S. forces by Iranian-backed Iraqi militias.
From October to February, an umbrella group of militias calling itself the Islamic Resistance in Iraq launched regular drone attacks on bases housing U.S. troops in Iraq and Syria. The group said it was retaliating for Washington’s support of Israel in the war in Gaza and wanted to force U.S. forces to withdraw from Iraq.
Those attacks halted after a stroke on a base in Jordan killed three U.S. soldiers and prompted U.S. retaliatory strikes in Iraq.

U.S. POSTPONES DECISION ON AID TO ISRAELI BATTALION ACCUSED OF ABUSES
WASHINGTON — 

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has determined that an Israeli army battalion committed grave human-rights violations against Palestinians in the West Bank before the war in Gaza. But he said in a letter to House Speaker Mike Johnson that he is postponing a decision on blocking aid to the unit to give Israel more time to right the wrongdoing.
The undated letter, obtained by The Associated Press on Friday, defers a decision on whether to withhold U.S. assistance to an Israeli military unit for the first time over its treatment of Palestinians and its compliance with international and human rights law. Israeli leaders, anticipating the U.S. decision this week, have angrily protested any such aid restrictions.
Blinken stressed that overall U.S. military support for Israel’s defense against Hamas and other threats would not be affected by the State Department’s eventual decision on the one unit.
It comes as Blinken is again headed to Israel. An Israeli foreign ministry official told The Associated Press that Blinken will visit on Tuesday, the latest trip he and other top U.S. officials have made since the war in Gaza began.