BEIRUT: Israeli strikes on Lebanon`s eastern city of Baalbek in the Bekaa Valley killed 40 people while another strike in Sidon, the main city of south Lebanon, wounded five UN peacekeepers, Lebanon`s health ministry announced on Thursday.

Israel has repeatedly battered strongholds of Lebanese group Hezbollah in the southern suburbs of the capital Beirut.

The Israeli military carried out two waves of air strikes, one late Wednesday and another on early Thursday.

Lebanon`s Al Jadeed TV reported there were at least four strikes on Thursday.

Hezbollah secretary general Naim Qassem on Wednesday said he did not believe that political action would bring an end to hostilities. He said there could be a road to indirect negotiations if Israel stopped its attacks.

`When the enemy decides to stop the aggression, there is a path for negotiations that we have clearly defined indirect negotiations through the Lebanese state and speaker (of parliament Nabih) Berri,` Qassem said.

More than 3,000 people have been killed in Israeli strikes on Lebanon over the last year, the vast majority in the past six weeks.

Lebanese rescuers scoured a destroyed apartment building in the town of Barja, south of Beirut, for bodies or survivors after an Israeli strike on Tuesday killed 20 people there, Lebanon`s health ministry said.

Moussa Zahran, who lived on one of the upper floors of the building, returned to sift through theruins of his home. His burned feet were wrapped in gauze and his son and wife were in hospital after being wounded in the strike.

`These rocks that you see here weigh 100 kilos; they fell on a 13-kilo kid,` he said, referring to his son and the apartment wall that collapsed on him during the strike.

It was not clear whether the strike targeted a member of Hezbollah. There was no evacuation warning ahead of the air raid.

Five UN peacekeepers were also wounded in an Israeli air strike in southern Lebanon on Thursday that also killed three civilians, the Lebanese army said. The raid in Sidon, the main city in southernLebanon, struck near an army checkpoint.

`The Israeli enemy targeted a car while it was passing through the Awali checkpoint in Sidon,` the army said in a statement. Three civilians inside the car were killed, the military said, and five members of the Malaysian contingent in the UN peacekeeping mission, UNIFIL, were injured.

Three soldiers at the checkpoint were also hurt, it said.

Israel launched air strikes across southern suburbs of Beirut overnight, with one hitting an area near the airport.

Taxi driver Abu Elie, who was at the airport when the strikes hit, said `the entire car park shook`.

`People were carrying their suit-cases on their shoulders and running,` he said.

12 killed in Gaza school bombing An Israeli air strike on a Gaza school housing displaced people in the north of the Palestinian territory, killed 12 people, Gaza`s civil defence agency said.

There were `12 martyrs and a large number of injuries as a result of the occupation aircraft bombing` of a school housing displaced people in Al-Shati refugee camp, west of Gaza City, the agency said in a statement.

Agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal said earlier that at least 27 people were killed in Israeli attack on the Gaza Strip on Thursday. -Agencies