BEIRUT (AP) — The number of people killed in a building collapse in the city of Tripoli in northern Lebanon has risen to 15, state media reported Monday.
A further eight people were injured, the state-run National News Agency reported. Lebanon’s civil defense said at least one person suffered a gunshot wound. Residents of the area gathered around the crater where the building had fallen and fired in the air following the collapse.
The six-story apartment building in the impoverished Bab Tabbaneh neighborhood collapsed Sunday afternoon. Resident of Tripoli, Lebanon’s second largest city, have long complained of government neglect and shoddy infrastructure.
Building collapses are not uncommon in Tripoli due to poor building standards, but the incident on Sunday sparked particular outrage due to the high death toll.
Surrounding buildings in the area were evacuated out of fear that they, too, might be structurally compromised.
Officials have pledged to investigate the cause of the collapse and take legal measures against those found to be responsible for it.
Rescue workers and residents search for survivors in the rubble of a building that collapsed in the northern city of Tripoli, Lebanon, Sunday, Feb. 8, 2026. (AP Photo)
Rescue workers and residents search for survivors in the rubble of a building that collapsed in the northern city of Tripoli, Lebanon, Sunday, Feb. 8, 2026. (AP Photo)
Rescue workers and residents search for survivors in the rubble of a building that collapsed in the northern city of Tripoli, Lebanon, Sunday, Feb. 8, 2026. (AP Photo)
BEIRUT (AP) — Israelis forces seized a local official with a Sunni Islamist group and an ally of the Palestinian militant Hamas group in an operation in southern Lebanon early on Monday, and took him to Israel for questioning, the Israeli military and Lebanese state media reported.
Also on Monday, an Israeli drone struck a car in the southern Lebanese village of Yanouh, killing three people, including a 3-year-old child, Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency said, quoting the Health Ministry.
The Israeli military later said it struck Hezbollah artillery official Ahmad Salami. It said it was aware of a “claim that uninvolved civilians were killed” and that the case is under review.
According to the NNA agency, Atwi Atwi — a local official with the Sunni Islamist group al-Jamaa al-Islamiya, or the Islamic Group in English — was taken in the southern village of Hebbarieh, in the region of Hasbaya and close to the border with Israel.
A statement from the Israeli military said Israeli troops apprehended an Islamic Group official in a “targeted intelligence-based operation.” It did not release the official's name.
The Islamic Group condemned the seizure, saying it was part of Israel’s daily attacks and violations of Lebanon’s sovereignty. It called on the Lebanese state to work for the release of Atwi.
The Islamic Group is Lebanon's branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, a pan-Islamist political group, with an armed wing in Lebanon known as Fajr Forces.
After the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war in October 2023, the Fajr Forces joined forces with the Lebanese Shiite militant Hezbollah group, launching rockets across the border into Israel that it said were in support of Hamas in Gaza.
The Brotherhood has been outlawed in much of the Middle East and labeled a terror group. Last month, the Trump administration designated the Lebanese, Jordanian and Egyptian branches of the Brotherhood as terrorist organizations.
Al-Jamaa al-Islamiya's leader, Mohammed Takkoush, said during the 14-month war between Hezbollah and Israel that his group and Hezbollah put aside their differences on conflicts in Syria and Yemen to join forces against Israel.
Hezbollah started attacking Israel on Oct. 8, 2023, a day after Hamas attacked southern Israel, triggering the latest Israel-Hamas war. Israel later launched a widespread bombardment of Lebanon that severely weakened Hezbollah, followed by a ground invasion.
The conflict ended with a U.S.-brokered ceasefire in 2024, and since then, Israel has carried out almost daily airstrikes and ground incursions into Lebanon that left more than 100 civilians dead according to the United Nations. Israel says it's carrying out the operations to remove Hezbollah strongholds and threats against Israel.
The Israel-Hezbollah war killed more than 4,000 people in Lebanon, including hundreds of civilians, and caused an estimated $11 billion in damage and destruction, according to the World Bank. In Israel, 127 people died, including 80 soldiers.
People gather as Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam tours areas in southern Lebanon along the border with Israel that the Lebanese army says it has been cleared of the armed presence of the militant Hezbollah group, in the village of Yarine, Saturday, Feb. 7, 2026. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)
