Hezbollah fires over 200 rockets into Israel in retaliation of the killing of senior commander

The Lebanese Hezbollah group has claimed responsibility for launching more than 200 rockets at several Israeli military bases on Thursday in response to a strike that killed one of its senior commanders.

The Iran-backed militant group's attack was one of the largest in the ongoing conflict along the Lebanon-Israel border, with tensions escalating in recent weeks.

The Israeli military reported that "numerous projectiles and suspicious aerial targets" had entered its territory from Lebanon, many of which were intercepted. There were no immediate reports of casualties.

The military stated that about 200 "projectiles" were launched toward the occupied Syrian Golan Heights and over 20 drones into Israeli territory, but that it had intercepted some of them.

Following Hezbollah's attack, Israel struck various towns in southern Lebanon, targeting Hezbollah's "military structures" in the southern border towns of Ramyeh and Houla.

Lebanon's state-run National News Agency reported that an Israeli drone strike in Houla killed at least one person. Israeli jets also broke the sound barrier over the Lebanese capital and other areas in the country.

Israel acknowledged on Wednesday that it had killed Mohammad Naameh Nasser, who headed one of Hezbollah's three regional divisions in southern Lebanon, a day earlier.

Hours after the killing, Hezbollah launched scores of Katyusha rockets and Falaq rockets with heavy warheads into northern Israel and the occupied Syrian Golan Heights.

It launched more rockets on Thursday and said it had also sent exploding drones into several bases.

Nasser was of great importance to Hezbollah, which said he took part in battles in conflicts in Syria and Iraq from 2011 until 2016 and fought in the group's last war with Israel in 2006. Two other senior Hezbollah commanders have also been killed.

The U.S. and France are continuing to scramble to prevent the skirmishes from spiralling into an all-out war, which they fear could spill-over across the region.