Lebanon has suspended in-person classes in the Beirut area for Monday, the education ministry announced on Sunday, citing safety concerns after a series of Israeli air strikes this week.

Education Minister Abbas Halabi announced in a statement "the suspension of in-person teaching" in schools, technical institutes and private higher education institutions in Beirut and parts of the neighboring Metn, Baabda and Shouf districts on Monday "for the safety of students, educational institutions and parents, in light of the current dangerous conditions". Private education institutions must also provide online classes as an option until the end of December, it said.

The Lebanese civilians most devastated by the Israeli war are Shiite Muslims, and many of them believe they are being unfairly punished because they share a religious identity with Hezbollah militants and often live in the same areas.

"This is clear," said Wael Murtada, a young Shiite man who anxiously watched paramedics search rubble after a recent Israeli airstrike destroyed his uncle's two-story home and killed 10 people. "Who else is being attacked?"

An Israeli airstrike that killed three journalists and wounded others in Lebanon last month was most likely a deliberate attack on civilians and an apparent war crime, an international human rights group said Monday.

The Oct. 25 airstrike killed three journalists as they slept at a guesthouse in southeast Lebanon in one of the deadliest attacks on the media since the war began 13 months ago.

The Israeli army on Monday said it had struck a Hezbollah command center in the downtown Beirut neighborhood of Basta in a deadly air strike at the weekend.

"The IDF (Israeli military) struck a Hezbollah command center," the army told AFP regarding the strike that the Lebanese health ministry said killed 29 people and wounded 67 on Saturday.

Foreign ministers from the world's leading industrialized nations are meeting Monday, with the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East entering decisive phases and a certain pressure to advance diplomatic efforts ahead of the new U.S. administration taking over.

Hopes for brokering a cease-fire in Gaza and Lebanon are foremost on the agenda of the Group of Seven meeting outside Rome that is gathering ministers from Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States.

Renewed Israeli strikes hit Beirut’s southern suburbs on Monday, after an Israeli army evacuation warning and following heavy raids the previous night.

The official National News Agency reported "two consecutive strikes in the vicinity of the Haret Hreik area", as AFPTV images showed heavy smoke rising from two locations.

Israel's far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir said Monday that a ceasefire agreement with Lebanon would be "a big mistake and a missed historic opportunity to eradicate Hezbollah," warning Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that "it is not too late" to stop the looming deal.

Israel and Lebanon are on the verge of a ceasefire agreement to end the Israel-Hezbollah conflict, two senior Israeli officials and two U.S. officials told U.S. news portal Axios.

Israel's state-run Kan broadcaster said Sunday that Israel has signed off on a U.S.-backed ceasefire with Hezbollah in Lebanon and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is now working on how to present it to the public -- assuming it is approved by the Lebanese group.

The aim is to present the truce not as a “compromise” but as beneficial to Israel, Kan reports.

Lebanon's state media reported a slew of Israeli air strikes on Beirut's southern suburbs on Sunday, after the Israeli military posted evacuation calls online for parts of the Hezbollah bastion.