MUNICH (AP) — Bayern Munich goalkeeper Manuel Neuer suffered another injury setback that will rule him out of Tuesday’s Champions League game against Atalanta.
Bayern said Saturday that Neuer has a minor muscle tear in his left calf from the team’s 4-1 win over Borussia Mönchengladbach on Friday and that he will be out “for the time being.”
It’s the second time Neuer tore a left calf muscle in as many months as he had the same injury during Bayern’s 3-0 win over Werder Bremen last month. That kept him out for three weeks until his comeback on Friday.
Neuer will be 40 later this month and his contract with Bayern is up at the end of the season. The club reportedly wants to offer him a one-year extension.
Jonas Urbig will step in again in his absence.
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Bayern Munich goalkeeper Manuel Neuer warms up ahead of the Bundesliga soccer game between Bayern Munich and Mönchengladbach in Munich, Germany, Friday, March 6, 2026. (Harry Langer/dpa via AP)
BEIRUT (AP) — An Israeli special force that landed in eastern Lebanon overnight in search of information about a navigator who has been missing for nearly 40 years did not find his remains, the Israeli military said Saturday. The operation left dozens of people dead and dozens more wounded.
Israel has been trying for decades to find out what happened to Ron Arad since he went missing after parachuting from a fighter jet that crashed in Lebanon in 1986. Arad was involved in attacking suspected Palestinian militants. He was captured alive by local gunmen.
The Israeli military did not say where the force landed in Lebanon but the Lebanese army and state media said an Israeli commando force landed on the mountains along the border with Syria before heading to the eastern town of Nabi Chit, where they clashed with Hezbollah and local fighters. Lebanon’s Health Ministry said at least 41 people were killed and 40 wounded overnight in Nabi Chit and areas nearby.
The Lebanese army said three soldiers were among those killed in the exchange of fire. It said four helicopters took part in the operation, two of which conducted the landing. It also reported that residents clashed with the Israeli force while Lebanese troops went on alert and fired light bombs.
Lebanese army commander Gen. Rudolphe Haikal said later Friday that the Israeli force that conducted the operation was dressed in Lebanese army uniforms and used ambulances during the operation with signs of Hezbollah’s Islamic Health Organization.
A resident of Nabi Chit told The Associated Press that the Israeli force entered the town and dug up a grave in a cemetery before it left. The man who spoke on condition of anonymity out of security concerns had no further details.
The Israeli army’s Arabic spokesman Avichay Adraee posted on X that the force did not find Arad's remains or any evidence related to him.
Hezbollah said its members clashed with the Israeli force, and that Israel’s air force conducted some 40 airstrikes in the area in order for the unit on the ground to be able to withdraw.
Arad's wife urged Israel’s leaders not to endanger the lives of Israeli soldiers in their search to bring home his body.
“Our desire to know what happened to Ron stops the moment it endangers Israeli soldiers,” his wife, Tami, wrote on Facebook, noting that the family has said this multiple times through the years.
“For 40 years we have lived with the fact that Ron is missing, and we want to know what happened to Ron, but not at any price. The sanctity of life is above any closing of the circle of certainty for us,” she added.
Adraee said the Israeli force did not suffer any casualties.
A Shiite Muslim faction called the Believers’ Resistance captured Arad after he landed, and released some photos of him early on before all traces of him disappeared.
Arad was believed to have been held in Nabi Chit until 1988, after which he went missing following a fierce battle between Hezbollah fighters and Israeli troops in the village of Meidoun further south.
In December, a retired Lebanese officer, Ahmed Shukr, disappeared in eastern Lebanon while meeting some people who wanted to buy a plot of land. His family believes Israeli operatives kidnapped him to get information about the case and took him to Israel.
Shukr’s wife and brother told The Associated Press recently that the retired officer does not have any information about Arad’s fate.
In 1994, helicopter-borne Israeli commandos landed deep in Lebanon’s eastern Bekaa Valley, where they seized the leader of the Believers’ Resistance, Mustafa Dirani, and took him to Israel. Dirani was released 10 years later in a prisoners exchange with Hezbollah.
In 2008, Hezbollah sent to Israel through mediators a report about Arad in which it suggested that he most likely died after escaping from his captors while trying to reach Israel. The Hezbollah report was published by Israeli media outlets at the time.
Elsewhere in Lebanon, Israel’s air force conducted strikes on different parts of eastern and southern Lebanon.
The new airstrikes were the latest since the last round of fighting between Israel and Hezbollah began Monday. The Iran-backed group fired rockets and drones into Israel in retaliation for the killing of Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei after Israel and the U.S. began attacking Iran on Feb. 28, triggering the latest war in the Middle East.
On Saturday morning, airstrikes were reported on the southern villages of Zawtar al-Sharqiyah, Arab Saleem and Jibchit. The strike on Jibchit killed six people, including four members of the same family, while in Zawtar al-Sharqiyah five people were killed state news agency said.
Associated Press writer Melanie Lidman contributed to this report from Tel Aviv, Israel.
A grave, background, dug by Israeli forces landed overnight late Friday, searching for Israeli co-pilot Ron Arad who was captured and then went missing after his fighter jet crashed over south Lebanon in 1986, in Nabi Chit village, eastern Lebanon, Saturday, March 7, 2026. (AP Photo/Ali Salem)
People check the damage left by Israeli airstrikes late Friday, in the village of Nabi Chit, eastern Lebanon, Saturday, March 7, 2026, where Israeli forces landed overnight and dug a grave in a cemetery searching for Israeli co-pilot Ron Arad who was captured and then went missing after his fighter jet crashed over south Lebanon in 1986. (AP Photo/Ali Salem)
People check the damage left by Israeli airstrikes, Saturday, March 7, 2026 in the village of Nabi Chit, eastern Lebanon late Friday, where Israeli forces landed overnight and dug a grave in a cemetery searching for Israeli co-pilot Ron Arad who was captured and then went missing after his fighter jet crashed over south Lebanon in 1986. (AP Photo/Ali Salem)
People check the damage left by Israeli airstrikes, Saturday, March 7, 2026, in the village of Nabi Chit, eastern Lebanon late Friday, where Israeli forces landed overnight and dug a grave in a cemetery searching for Israeli co-pilot Ron Arad who was captured and then went missing after his fighter jet crashed over south Lebanon in 1986. (AP Photo/Ali Salem)
A huge crater left by an Israeli airstrike in the village of Nabi Chit, eastern Lebanon late Friday, March 6, 2026, where Israeli forces landed overnight and dug a grave in a cemetery searching for Israeli co-pilot Ron Arad who was captured and then went missing after his fighter jet crashed over south Lebanon in 1986. (AP Photo/Ali Salem)
