Lebanon and Israel are set to hold the first direct diplomatic talks in decades on Tuesday in Washington following more than a month of war between Israel and the Hezbollah militant group that has rocked the tiny Mediterranean country.

At least 11 people, including two children, were killed as Israeli invading forces demolished homes in southern Lebanon and issued evacuation diktats.

At least 36 people were killed and dozens of others injured in Israeli airstrikes across Lebanon since dawn Wednesday, as regional escalation continued to flare up, Lebanese media reported.

Israel carried out strikes in Lebanon on Wednesday, hours after the United States and Iran reached a Pakistani-mediated two-week cease-fire.

AP journalists saw charred bodies in vehicles and on the ground at one of Beirut’s busiest intersections in the central Corniche al Mazraa neighborhood, a mixed commercial and residential area.

At the doors of Beirut’s Rafik Hariri University Hospital, the human cost of Israel’s weeks-long assault on Lebanon was etched onto the faces of desperate families waiting for news of their loved ones.