Israel’s military has been intensifying operations against Hezbollah in Lebanon in an apparent attempt to pressure the militant group into a cease-fire.

Lebanon’s capital city is returning to a cycle of violence and destruction just as it was beginning to stabilize after years of chaos.

Israel and Lebanon's Hezbollah traded deadly blows on Thursday as their war raged on despite signs of progress in U.S. ceasefire efforts, with airstrikes pounding Beirut's southern suburbs and rockets flying into northern Israel.

The Lebanese militant group captured an advanced Israeli anti-tank missile in the 2006 war, and its ally, Iran, reverse-engineered it, Israeli officials say.

The group’s supporters remain steadfast in the face of widespread displacement and thousands of deaths.

For years, Israelis were told that in the next war with Hezbollah, the Lebanese militia would fire thousands of rockets and missiles a day, overwhelming their air defenses, causing blackouts, death and destruction.

Israel on Friday unleashed a spate of airstrikes on Beirut's southern suburbs, an area seen as a hotbed of Lebanon's Iran-allied Hezbollah movement. In the evening, the Israeli military carried out four airstrikes on the suburbs,

Israeli air strikes hit Hezbollah's south Beirut stronghold on Friday and crumpled an 11-storey building, official media reported and AFP images showed, after Israeli military evacuation warnings. Israeli strikes on Friday also hit south Lebanon,