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Israel’s military launched a wave of air strikes in southern Lebanon in the early hours of Sunday, in what it said was an attempt to foil an “extensive attack” by the militant group Hizbollah.

The exchange of fire was the biggest between Israel and Iran-backed Hizbollah since they fought a 34-day war in 2006, and marked a sharp escalation of the hostilities that have simmered between the two sides since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza last year.

Hassan Nasrallah, Hizbollah’s leader, sought to draw a line under the exchange on Sunday evening, saying the attack was over, although its impact would still have to be assessed.

“If the result is satisfactory and the intended goal is achieved, we will consider the response operation has ended,” Nasrallah said in a televised address. “If the result is not enough, we will reserve the right to respond at another time.”

Nasrallah said Lebanese people who had fled their homes in fear of a wider war could return, adding that they could now “take a breath and relax”. 

Israel began its attack shortly before 5am local time, deploying 100 jets to bomb about 40 sites in Lebanon after identifying what it said were preparations by Hizbollah “to fire missiles and rockets”.

Nasrallah said the group had shortly afterward launched more than 340 Katyusha rockets and a large number of drones at 11 military targets in Israel’s north and the occupied Golan Heights, triggering air raid sirens across the area.

Speaking at a cabinet meeting on Sunday afternoon, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel’s strike had destroyed thousands of short-range rockets and all the drones launched by Hizbollah — which he said had been meant to hit a “strategic target” in the centre of Israel.

“[Hizbollah leader Hassan] Nasrallah in Beirut and [Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali] Khamenei in Tehran need to know that this is an additional step in changing the situation in the north, and returning our residents securely to their homes,” Netanyahu said. “And I reiterate — this is not the end of the story.”

Hizbollah said its barrage was retaliation for Israel’s assassination last month of Fuad Shukr, one of its most senior commanders, in an air strike in Beirut.

The killing of Shukr was followed the next day by the assassination in Tehran of Ismail Haniyeh, political leader of the Palestinian militant group Hamas. It prompted both Hizbollah and Iran to pledge retaliation against Israel, fuelling fears the region could slide towards all-out conflict.

Nasrallah acknowledged that Hizbollah’s retaliation had been delayed in part because of the mobilisation of Israeli and American military forces. He said a response from Iran and its Yemeni Houthi allies was yet to come.

As the exchange of fire unfolded early on Sunday, Ben Gurion airport in Tel Aviv suspended flights, and Israel’s defence minister Yoav Gallant declared a “special situation” across the country, giving him powers to restrict gatherings and limit access to certain areas.

However, according to initial assessments by Israel’s military, the barrage caused “very little” damage. Casualties on both sides were limited. One Israeli soldier was killed — by debris from Israeli missile interceptors, according to the country’s ambassador to the US — and two wounded. Three people — all presumed to be militants — were killed in Lebanon.

By early afternoon, flights to and from Tel Aviv had resumed, and most restrictions in Israel had been lifted. Some flights to and from Beirut were cancelled or delayed, but the airport remained open.

In Lebanon, the Israeli strikes hit around 30 different targets in the south, mostly in areas close to the border, but some further inland. Images circulated in local media showed smoke rising above various wooded areas, likely to be where Hizbollah’s static launchers are positioned, and villages along the border.

Nasrallah said Hizbollah’s attack had gone “as planned” and denied Israeli claims the group had intended to fire thousands of projectiles. Neither Israel nor Hizbollah provided evidence for their claims.

The Hizbollah leader spent much of a one-hour speech seeking to convince his audience the attack had been effective, stressing the decision to strike only military targets and avoid civilian casualties. The speech appeared designed to assuage a domestic audience weary of a war that has displaced more than 100,000 from border areas and killed more than 120 civilians.

Nasrallah said the group’s main target was the Glilot military intelligence base on the outskirts of Tel Aviv. This is about 110km inside Israeli territory, making the attack the deepest yet into the country. The Israeli military said Glilot had not been hit.

The attacks came as officials gathered in Egypt for the latest talks aimed at ending the war. The US and Arab states see the talks as the best chance of preventing a full-on conflict.

The White House said US President Joe Biden was “closely monitoring events in Israel and Lebanon”. Washington has deployed additional warships and fighter aircraft to deter Hizbollah and Iran and help defend Israel.

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free

Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.

Russian lawmakers have hit back at reports of the arrest of Telegram chief executive Pavel Durov in France for failing to adequately moderate criminal activity on his messaging platform.

The Russia-born billionaire was arrested at the Paris-Le Bourget airport when he arrived in the country on his private jet from Azerbaijan on Saturday evening, according to French broadcaster TF1 and news agency AFP. 

The deputy speaker of the state Duma, Vladislav Davankov, said he had called on Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov to secure Durov’s release. “The arrest of [Durov] could have political motives and be a means of obtaining the personal data of Telegram users. We must not allow this,” he said on his Telegram channel.

Andrey Klishas, head of Russia’s Federation Council Committee on Constitutional Law, described France’s actions as a “fight for freedom of speech and European values” in a sarcastic post on his Telegram channel.

Durov had a warrant out for his arrest in France after authorities in the country began a preliminary investigation into whether a lack of moderation on the Dubai-headquartered platform had facilitated illegal activity including terrorism, drug peddling, money laundering, fraud and child exploitation, according to reports. He is expected to appear in court on Sunday. 

The Russian embassy in France said it had requested consular access to Durov although there was no request from his representatives, according to Interfax.

A representative for Telegram and Durov declined to comment.

Founded in 2013, Telegram has gained prominence in recent years to become an important communications tool for global leaders and a resource for sharing news and organising in geopolitical crises such as the Russia-Ukraine war and the Israel-Hamas conflict. With almost 1bn users, it is now one of the most popular messaging apps, rivalling Meta’s WhatsApp.

Durov’s positioning of Telegram as a privacy-orientated and censorship-resistant messaging platform has drawn scrutiny, with researchers warning that it has become a haven for criminals and hackers openly offering illicit services without repercussions. 

His detainment is likely to further increase global debate over the extent to which social media platforms and messaging apps should prioritise free speech or more tightly police the content they host, and whether executives should be held personally liable for lapses. 

The news has caused immediate backlash from free-speech proponents. “It’s 2030 in Europe and you’re being executed for liking a meme,” Elon Musk, the billionaire owner of X and a self-declared free-speech absolutist, wrote on his social media site on Saturday. Musk has clashed with EU and UK leaders over the perceived lax moderation of his platform, which police and analysts say was used alongside Telegram to organise and fuel far-right riots in Southport, UK. 

Durov, known for always wearing black and embracing extreme health fads, was previously hailed the “Mark Zuckerberg of Russia” after in 2007 co-founding the country’s most popular social media network, VKontakte, in his native St Petersburg. 

However, he fled Russia in 2014 and sold the company, after refusing to comply with demands from the country’s security agency to share the data of certain Ukrainian users of VK, per his telling. A cryptocurrency fortune then allowed him to travel and fund Telegram before settling in Dubai, which he has called “neutral”. He currently has dual French-Emirati citizenship. Forbes estimates his net worth at $15.5bn. 

While Durov was born in Russia, he has been adamant that he has cut ties with the country, amid claims by critics that the Kremlin may still have links to or leverage over Telegram. 

“He thought his biggest problems were in Russia and left . . . He wanted to be a brilliant ‘citizen of the world,’ living well without a homeland,” former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev, now a prominent rightwing commentator, wrote on his Telegram channel on Sunday. “He miscalculated. To our common enemies, he is still Russian — unpredictable and dangerous, of different blood,” he said.

In an interview with the Financial Times earlier this year, his first since 2017, Durov defended his “hands-off” approach to content moderation, saying that “typically feedback from users is please do not start censoring any content”. 

However, over the years, he has occasionally bowed to public pressure as regulators have circled, taking down Isis-linked groups in 2019, and extremist and white supremacist groups involved in the January 6 2021 storming of the US Capitol building.

Earlier this year in Spain, a court ordered the app to be blocked in the country over an investigation into the sharing of illegal content protected by copyright. The ban has since been halted. 

Telegram’s guidelines ban terrorist channels and state that it does not allow spam and scams, illegal pornography or the promotion of violence on “publicly viewable Telegram channels”.

No matter how the next Toronto Blue Jays vs. Boston Red Sox game plays out, Danny Jansen will be able to call himself a winner.

That’s because on Monday, the Red Sox catcher will be finishing a game that he started as a player on the opposing team. In doing so, Jansen will go down in Major League Baseball history as the first person to play for both teams in the same game.

The peculiar switch-up was set in motion when a game on June 26 was suspended during the second inning because of heavy rain at Boston’s Fenway Park. At the time, Jansen played for Toronto. A month later, Jansen was traded to the Red Sox, with the team hoping to both make use of his right-handed bat and strengthen its catching lineup.

Before the game was halted, Jansen was at bat for the Blue Jays. Two months later, play will resume — this time, with Jansen behind the plate and in a Red Sox jersey. The Jays will have a pinch hitter in Jansen’s place.

Red Sox manager Alex Cora reportedly confirmed on Friday that Jansen would be part of the starting lineup, replacing catcher Reese McGuire.

“Yeah he’s catching. Let’s make history,” Cora told reporters.

According to MLB.com, it would be a first for a player at the Major League level, but there’s at least one instance of a player appearing on both teams in the same game in the minor leagues. In 1986, Dale Holman played for both the Syracuse Chiefs and the Richmond Braves in a game broken up by rain.

In an interview with The Athletic published last this week, Jansen said the potential to make history “would be awesome.”

“It’s a cool thing to be part of something that lives on and is just a rarity,” he said. “I try to be in the moment as much as possible. But one day, if this happens … it’s going to be a cool thing to look back on.”

The oddity of the scenario has inspired baseball fans to muse about the wild, “only in baseball” possibilities of the game.

“The Danny jansen thing makes me remember one of my favourite baseball quirks: it is technically possible to strike yourself out,” wrote one user on X.

When the game resumes, the pinch hitter taking Jansen’s place will inherit Jansen’s one strike on the count. If the pinch hitter goes on to strike out, Jansen was relieved to know, that strikeout won’t show up in his stats, according to The Athletic. The pinch hitter taking Jansen’s place will own whatever happens when the at-bat resumes on Monday afternoon.