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Hello, welcome to News Hour.

We're coming to you live from London.

I'm Paul Henley.

This is the BBC World Service.

The president of Lebanon, Joseph Aoun, has said that the latest Israeli military action in the south of his country is a prelude to a full-scale ground invasion.

Israel started blowing up bridges over a crucial river in southern Lebanon, saying it's targeting Hezbollah infrastructure.

That was the moment one bridge was hit today.

The Israeli Defence Minister, Israel Katz, had given orders to destroy any bridge over the

Littani that had been used by the army group, the armed group rather backed by Iran.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and I have ordered the Israel Defence Forces

to immediately destroy all bridges over the Litani River

that are used for terrorist activities in order to prevent Hezbollah terrorists

and weapons from moving south.

And also, we've asked them to accelerate the destruction of Lebanese homes in the border villages to thwart threats to

Israeli settlements following the models for Baitanun and Rafa in Gaza. In just over three weeks

since the latest war began, the Israeli military is thought to have killed more than a thousand people in Lebanon and displaced up to a million.

The BBC's former Middle East correspondent, Jim Muir, is in Beirut, the Lebanese capital.

I spoke to him earlier and asked him what an expanded Israeli offensive would look like.

Well, I don't think it's going to be a great big push up to Beirut or whatever like we saw in 1982.

I think it's going to be much more incremental.

They're talking about, as you were saying, they're destroying all the remaining homes along the border strip,

...