BARJA, Lebanon (AP) — Lebanese rescuers have recovered 30 bodies from the rubble after an overnight Israeli attack on a residential building in the city of Barja, the Lebanese Civil Defense Service said Wednesday The wars in the Middle East continue with no sign of abating.

It remained unclear whether there were any survivors or bodies trapped under the rubble after the airstrike on Tuesday evening, which came without warning. There was no statement from the Israeli military and the intended target of the attack was unknown.

Barja, a town north of the port city of Sidon in central Lebanon, has not been regularly attacked so far in the conflict.

“Something pulled me hard and then the explosion happened,” said Moussa Zahran, who was at home with his wife and son when the building was hit. He said he couldn't see anything, but started digging through the rubble until he found his wife and son – alive but injured – and pulled them out. Both are still in the hospital, he said.

Another resident of the building, Muhyiddin Al-Qalaaji, said he was at work when the strike took place and heard the news from his wife, who called him in distress.

“There are a lot of dead and injured,” he said as he explained what he was able to save of the family’s belongings on Wednesday morning.

Civil defense official Mostafa Danaj said some neighbors reported people were still missing.

Israeli forces and the militant group Hezbollah have been clashing for more than a year since Hezbollah began firing rockets across the border shortly after the Palestinian Hamas attack. The October 7, 2023 attack from the Gaza Strip on southern Israel sparked the ongoing war There.

The war on the Lebanese front has escalated significantly since mid-September, when Israel launched massive airstrikes and a ground invasion.

A foreign worker was killed in a rocket attack near the northern Israeli city of Acre on Wednesday, according to emergency services Magen David Adom. The employee's nationality was initially not known.

Earlier in the day, sirens wailed across northern and central Israel, including in the populous Tel Aviv metropolitan area, as Hezbollah fired 10 rockets. A large part of a rocket hit a parked car in the central Israeli town of Raanana. Israeli media reported that rockets also struck an open area near Israel's main airport, although the airport said flights continued as normal.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke on Tuesday fired Defense Minister Yoav Gallant in a surprise announcement that sparked protests across the country. Gallant's successor is Foreign Minister Israel Katz, a longtime Netanyahu loyalist and experienced Cabinet minister.

Israeli police said they arrested 40 people during protests on Tuesday night as demonstrators blocked Israel's main street in Tel Aviv. Thousands of people gathered outside the Israeli parliament on Wednesday evening to protest against Gallant's dismissal.

Netanyahu has repeatedly been divided over the war in Gaza, but the prime minister had avoided letting go of his rival ahead of Tuesday's U.S. presidential election Former President Donald Trump celebrated a comeback victory.

Gallant had pushed back on some of Netanyahu's demands during indirect negotiations with Hamas over a ceasefire and the release of hostages and was seen as more open to realization At least a temporary ceasefire.

The Hamas attack that sparked the war killed around 1,200 people – mostly civilians – and Palestinian militants kidnapped 250 others that day. There are still around 100 hostages in the Gaza Strip, around a third of whom are believed to be dead.

The Israeli offensive has killed more than 43,000 people, according to Palestinian health authorities. They do not distinguish between civilians and combatants but say more than half of those killed were women and children.

Since the outbreak of the conflict between Israel and Hezbollah in 2023 At least 3,000 people were killed According to the Ministry of Health, around 13,500 people were injured in Lebanon, around a quarter of them women and children.

According to local authorities, 73 people have been killed in Hezbollah airstrikes in Israel so far, including 30 soldiers.

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Associated Press writers Abby Sewell in Beirut and Melanie Lidman in Tel Aviv, Israel, contributed to this report.