The leader of Hezbollah Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah challenged world intelligence services, notably the Israelis, who track him by the hour, during a three hour live broadcast interview with al-Mayadeen TV on Saturday. Nasrallah showed he has the technical ability to broadcast live for this length of time without fear of being located. Even more important, Nasrallah showed the capacity to receive electronic messages via an internet connection in his vicinity, allowing him to take questions and get breaking news from around the world. This is a clear indication that Nasrallah trusts Hezbollah’s technical competence, capable of jamming any interception signal and efficient enough to blind any local or international intelligence services trying to locate him.
Hezbollah seems to enjoy electronic abilities superior to those of many Middle Eastern and other countries. What is unusual is that Nasrallah displayed these abilities, online, to tens of thousands of people watching the interview.
Hezbollah’s electronic capability is not new: Israel tried to physically intercept its fibber optic landlines and to electronically intercept the mobile phones of many officers and leaders. Indeed, Israel’s interception capabilities made it possible, in the past, for the Israeli army to break into Hezbollah’s telephone network, exposing a spider web of connections and leading to the destruction of hundreds of Hezbollah homes, offices and bases during the 2006 war.
It is not a secret that by intercepting one mobile phone, it is possible to identify other mobile phones in the same location and to create a record of the phone’s IMEI even if the user changes his or her SIM card but keeps the same mobile phone.
Hezbollah recognised the mistake of its members and issued a serious warning to all members or leaders preventing them from carrying a mobile phone at work. Failure to follow those instructions caused much of the destruction Hezbollah suffered in the 2006 war.
At the same time, Hezbollah was able to use the same available technology to intercept and capture spies. In 2006 Hezbollah ambushed the Israeli Special Operation Forces (SOF) by creating a false track of the presence of one of their most wanted and top leaders at al-Rasoul al-A’zam, on the Beirut airport road. One of those present revealed at the last minute the plan that could have led to the killing and arrest of many SOF soldiers. The same spy fell into his own trap, a few years later, due to misuse of his mobile phone. The SIM card he uses to contact Israel with was intercepted by Hezbollah when he inserted it, by mistake, into his Lebanese phone. It took him very little time to realise his mistake, but not enough to escape to Israel. Hezbollah’s capability helped in arresting many spies of which some where not exposed overtly.
Far from hiding under the ground–as Israel propaganda tried to portray him for years after the 2006 war–Sayyed Nasrallah spoke very confidently in an elegant flat. In fact, Sayyed Nasrallah meets local politicians, regional officials, and other Hezbollah leaders in various flats in Beirut, never the same ones. This is another indication of his frequent movements, a security procedure in accordance with a figure of his stature on the most wanted list of many countries, including Middle Eastern and European ones collaborating with Israel and the USA.
Nasrallah’s professional security team freely moves him around inside Lebanon and abroad; he travels between Beirut and Damascus on a single long, busy road to meet President Bashar al-Assad. Nasrallah has an electronic media team providing him with all breaking news on the spot and a resumé of all newspapers and media outlets publishing information or articles related to the Middle East.
Hezbollah’s electronic abilities seem to be constantly updated in accordance with the latest technology and security measures needed to face his enemies and to protect his leaders and military capabilities. The battle between Israel and Hezbollah is not merely a military one but also a battle of intelligence and technology.
Lebanese President Michel Aoun yesterday warned of the “Israeli threats” which could lead to new wars, displacement and ethnic cleansing.
Speaking before members of the diplomatic corps accredited to Lebanon in the capital Beirut, Aoun said that “peace does not take place while deals are made at the expense of the refugee who was expelled from his land and his identity was stolen”.
“Peace does not come at the expense of manipulating demography and changing the geographical and social parameters of countries. Peace does not result from deepening racism and rejecting the other.”
The Lebanese president was referring to US President Donald Trump’s proposed Middle East peace plan dubbed the “deal of the century”.
In regards Syrian refugees in Lebanon, Aoun said the international community’s position is not clear about whether they should return to their country, warning that the proposed positions which link the refugees’ return to finding a political solution to the Syrian crisis is “worrying” because a solution could take a long time.
More than 1.2 million Syrian refugees live in Lebanon, a majority of them in areas that experience economic, political and security crises.
As has become the normal practice, Christmas Day’s air raid by Israel directed against targets near Damascus was largely ignored by the US media. Given the fact that Israel has bombed Syria more than two hundred times, the attack itself, which wounded three soldiers at a warehouse, was not particularly notable. But what was significant was the fact that it was the second time that Israel has used other planes to mask the approach of its own warplanes to the target. On this occasion, the masks consisted of two civilian airliners making their approaches to the airports in Beirut and Damascus. Fortunately, the Syrian Arab Air Defense Forces made the decision to delay the deployment of surface-to-air missiles and electronic jamming “to prevent a tragedy” and air traffic control was able to divert one of the passenger jets landing at Damascus to the reserve military airport in Khmeimim in southern Latakia.
Syrian anti-aircraft crews did manage to intercept and shoot down fourteen of the sixteen incoming missiles that were launched by six Israeli F-16 warplanes using US-made GPS-guided GBU-39 Small Diameter Bombs (SDBs). If the Syrian air defenses had been more reckless and gone after the F-16s themselves, they might have hit an airliner by mistake and hundreds of lives could have been lost.
The Russian Ministry of Defense, which was able to reconstruct the attack from radar imaging, condemned the incident, stating that “Provocative acts by the Israeli Air Force endangered two passenger jets when six of their F-16s carried out airstrikes on Syria from Lebanese airspace.” The terse Russian announcement reveals that beyond endangering hundreds of civilians, Israel had committed several war crimes in its action, which the Israeli government claimed was intended to destroy a shipment of Iranian-made Fajir-5 rockets, which was allegedly on its way to Hezbollah.
As Israel is not at war with Iran or Syria or Lebanon and it persists in attacking targets in Syria based on its own perception of threats, it meets the United Nations definition of an aggressor. And its violation of Lebanese air space to stage the attack on Syria was also an act of aggression. Both would normally be condemned in the UN Security Council but for the American veto protecting Israel.
Analysts have confirmed that the Israelis carried out the strikes in Syria by deliberately using scheduled airline departures and arrivals as cover to foil the improved and upgraded Syrian air defenses. Security sources in the region now believe that any civilian flights entering or leaving Damascus or Beirut are potentially in danger due to the Israeli tactics, which clearly accept endangering civilians to mask the movements of the warplanes.
The Israelis also used a Russian intelligence plane as a mask off the coast of Syria back in September, with fatal results for the crew after Syrian air defenses responded to the attack. Israel, of course, claimed innocence, insisting that it was the Syrians who shot down the Russian aircraft while the Israeli jets were legitimately targeting a Syrian army facility “from which weapons-manufacturing systems were supposed to be transferred to Iran and Hezbollah.”
The Russian aircraft was returning to base after a mission over the Mediterranean off the Syrian coast monitoring the activities of a French warship and at least one British RAF plane. As a large and relatively slow propeller driven aircraft on a routine intelligence gathering mission, the Ilyushin-20 had no reason to conceal its presence. It was apparently preparing to land at its airbase at Khmeimim when the incident took place.
Syrian air defenses were on high alert because Israel had attacked targets near Damascus on the previous day, including a Boeing 747 on the ground that Israel claimed to be transporting weapons.
The Israelis used four F-16 fighter bombers to stage the surprise night attack targeting sites near Latakia, close to the airbase being used by the Russians. They came in from the Mediterranean Sea using the Russian plane to mask their approach as the Ilyushin 20 would have presented a much larger radar profile for the air defenses.
The Israelis might have been expecting that the Syrians would not fire at all at the incoming planes knowing that one of them at least was being flown by their Russian allies. If that was the expectation, it proved wrong and it was indeed a Syrian S-200 ground to air missile directed by its guidance system to the larger target that brought down the plane and killed its fourteen crew members.
There was also a back story. The Israelis and Russian military had established a hotline precisely intended to avoid accidents. Israel reportedly used the line but only one minute before the incident took place, leaving no time for the Russian plane to take evasive action.
The Russian Ministry of Defense was irate. It saw the exploitation of the intelligence plane by the Israelis as a deliberate high-risk initiative. It warned “We consider these provocative actions by Israel as hostile. Fifteen Russian military service members have died because of the irresponsible actions of the Israeli military. This is absolutely contrary to the spirit of the Russian-Israeli partnership. We reserve the right for an adequate response.”
It’s the same old story. Israel does risky things like attacking its neighbors because it knows it will pay no price due to Washington’s support. The downing of the Russian plane and the current endangering civil aviation has created a situation that could easily escalate. What Israel is really thinking when it seeks to create anarchy all around its borders is anyone’s guess, but it is, to be sure, in no one’s interest to allow the process to continue.
Israel’s ambassador to Britain, Shlomo Argov, was shot and mortally wounded in 1982, giving Menachem Begin’s government the excuse needed to invade Lebanon and drive the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) out of Beirut.
The UK National Archives has refused a request by a Sputnik reporter — made under the Freedom of Information Act — to reveal what happened to the terrorists who attacked Mr. Argov.
Mr. Argov, 52, was leaving a diplomatic function at the Dorchester Hotel in Park Lane, central London, when a gunmen approached him and fired two shots.
He was hit in the head, went into a coma for three months and later lost his sight.
Mr. Argov was transferred to Hadassah University Hospital in Jerusalem. His death in 2003 was blamed on the injuries he received that fateful night in London.
The gunman — Hussein Ahmad Ghassan Said — was shot and injured by a police officer who was acting as Mr. Argov’s bodyguard and he was arrested, along with two other men who fled the scene in a car, which was chased through the streets of London.
Said and the two other men, who had links to the Palestinian extremist Abu Nidal Organisation, were convicted of attempted murder and jailed for life in March 1983.
The file on Hussein Ahmad Ghassan Said, Marwan Al-Banna and Nauoff Nagib Meflehel al-Rosan at the National Archives is marked as “closed until 2077”.
The file covers the events of January 1982-December 1984.
Although the terrorists were from Abu Nidal Organisation and not Yasser Arafat’s PLO, the Israeli government retaliated by launching Operation Peace for Galilee, a full-scale invasion of Lebanon.
The Israelis occupied parts of Beirut and in September 1982 their Falangist allies massacred hundreds of Palestinian civilians in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps while Israeli troops led by future prime minister Ariel Sharon turned a blind eye.
Israeli forces only left in 1985.
But what of the three men whose actions triggered these horrific events?
Said was a Jordanian national while al-Banna was Abu Nidal’s cousin and al-Rosan was a colonel in Saddam Hussain’s Iraqi intelligence agency.
The Abu Nidal Organization the PLO were enemies and ironically al-Banna and al-Rosan were also under orders to kill the PLO’s London representative, Nabil Ramlawi, but were arrested before they could get to him.
Said, al-Banna and al-Rosan were jailed for life at the Central Criminal Court in London and given minimum terms of between 30 and 35 years.
Two of them were reportedly later transferred to high security hospitals in the UK after becoming mentally ill.
In 1999 the respected Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz published an article claiming MI5 had knew about the plot.
Lord Alton, a former Liberal MP, tried to raise the issue in the House of Lords but was rebuffed when Lord Williams of Mostyn, a Home Office minister, refused to comment “on the operations of the security and intelligence agencies.”
The Independent newspaper also claimed a convicted murderer, and Liverpool police informer, Ronald Waldron, said he had given a “hot” warning of the plot to kill Argov.
“I gave them everything, the group’s whole list of targets. I told them that they were planning to kill Argov. They knew that Argov was on the list, but they still left him with one bodyguard, completely exposed to the assassins’ bullets. That was really a crime,” Waldron told The Independent.
In the intervening years Said, al-Banna and al-Rosan have vanished.
Are they still in jail? Are they in psychiatric hospitals? Have they been deported to Jordan or Iraq?
Or were they released and given political asylum in Britain?
A Sputnik reporter submitted a request under the Freedom of Information Act in September.
But earlier this month this request was refused by the National Archives, after “consultation with the Ministry of Justice”.
They said they were unable to open the file because it was exempt from the Freedom of Information Act under various grounds.
“When these exemptions apply, we are required to consider whether it is in the public interest to release this information and we regret to say, after very careful consideration, we do not think there is a public interest in doing so. These exemptions apply because we considered that the factors in favour of release are outweighed by the factors against releasing this information into the public domain at this time,” said the National Archives in a statement to Sputnik.
So what were the exemptions?
Sections 23 and 24 both cover “national security”.
“It is in the public interest that our security bodies can operate effectively in the interests of the United Kingdom, without disclosing information that may assist those determined to undermine the security of the United Kingdom and its citizens,” said the National Archives statement.
So perhaps the Israeli press were right and MI5 were privy to the plot and failed to stop it, or even allowed it to happen?
Another exemption was “law enforcement”.
“The Metropolitan Police Service has a duty to protect life and property, which would not include the release of information that would prejudice law enforcement,” said the National Archives statement.
But Mr. Argov is dead and his three attackers were jailed after a trial at the Old Bailey so what information could possibly be released that would “prejudice law enforcement”?
Unless one or all of the three attackers had been a police informant and was perhaps released early in a secret deal?
Another exemption was “physical and mental health”.
The Ministry of Justice’s “duty to openness and transparency under the FOI Act must not be fulfilled in such a way as to undermine public confidence that the right to privacy of victim’s families will be upheld, and must be balanced against its parallel duties to protect them from further harm, shock and distress.”
Sputnik has tried to contact Mr. Argov’s son, Gideon, a venture capitalist who lives in Boston, but without success.
The final exemption is “third party personal data”.
“The exemption applies because the document contains the personal information of one or more identifiable individuals reasonably assumed still to be living. These individuals have a reasonable expectation of privacy, which would not include the release of this information into the public domain during their lifetime,” says the National Archives statement.
But numerous files have been released by the National Archives containing personal information about individuals who are still alive.
US President Donald Trump signed into law a bill ensuring the imposition of sanctions on members of the Palestinian group Hamas and Lebanese organization Hezbollah for the use of civilians as human shields, the White House said in a statement.
“On Friday, December 21, 2018, the President signed into law: H.R. 3342, the ‘Sanctioning the Use of Civilians as Defenseless Shields Act,’ which requires the President to identify and impose specified sanctions on members of Hizballah or Hamas who use civilians as human shields,” the statement read.
Washington has been supporting Israel in accusing Hamas and Hezbollah of using civilians as human shields and exploiting infrastructure as a cover-up for their offensive activities. The United States has designated both groups as terrorist organizations, while other countries including Russia and China, regard the two groups as legitimate political parties.
Last week, US Deputy Secretary of State John Sullivan said that the US was looking to lead the international fight against terrorism, however, wants other countries to do more to contribute to the effort.
In November, the US State Department offered a bounty of up to $5 million for information on a leader of the Hamas organization and two leaders of the Hezbollah.
The operation “Northern Shield” was launched with great fanfare by the Israeli occupier on December 4, allegedly aimed at “exposing and neutralizing the cross-border attack tunnels that Hezbollah dug from Lebanon to Israel”. Indeed, the Lebanese Resistance has repeatedly promised to no longer be on a defensive position in case of aggression or war, and carry the fighting inside occupied Palestine, or even to liberate Galilee. Spokesmen of the Israeli government ostensibly congratulated themselves on what they presented as thwarting the plans of the dreaded Hassan Nasrallah.
Israeli propaganda and its docile Western media relays presented the operation as a large-scale military offensive that would strike a huge blow to the Party of God, as if the Zionist entity had entered Lebanese territory (or was about to do so), whether on land or underground. A speech by the Hezbollah Secretary General was announced for the same day by the Israeli and Western media, which would have seemed to confirm the importance of the Israeli operation. And given Hezbollah’s silence, it was ultimately said that this silence was due to the shock in which the Lebanese Resistance found itself after this surprise operation that would have ruined its most secret plans.
But what is it all really about? First and foremost, it is ridiculous to equate drilling and excavation work taking place inside occupied Palestine, and not encroaching in any way on Lebanese territory, with some kind of offensive, or even a military operation. Heavy construction, earthworks and fortification work on the northern border of Israel have been conducted by the IDF since 2015, with the aim of creating a Maginot-kind line of defense against Hezbollah (to emphasize its anachronistic character, Al-Manar nicknamed it The Wall of Illusion).
If the Israeli and Western media refrained from any mediatization on this subject, it is because these works of engineering did not serve the propaganda of Israel, underlining on the contrary its weakness: the Zionist entity is indeed cornered to a defensive position for the first time in its existence. But Hezbollah itself has clearly boasted about this upheaval, notably by organizing a media tour in April 2017 to expose the Israeli measures to the world. The promise of February 16, 2011, in which Hassan Nasrallah announced to his fighters that they must be ready to receive, one day, the order to liberate Galilee, has indeed been taken very seriously by Israel. Even more so after the war in Syria, where Hezbollah has acquired and demonstrated its offensive capabilities by liberating vast areas of territory from the presence of ISIS, leading battles that, by their nature, extent and deployed personnel and weapons, are no longer guerrilla warfare. Hezbollah’s offensive capabilities have never been based on the existence of tunnels, as evidenced already by the cross-border capture of Israeli soldiers in July 2006, and are now more similar to operations launched by conventional armies, as Hassan Nasrallah pointed out in an interview on August 19, 2016:
When Hezbollah intervenes in the war in Syria, and fights as a very large formation, and with very different armaments, or as part of a very large formation with various armaments, and participates in major and very extensive offensive operations, when he manages to repel armed men (ISIS terrorists), who are not normal combatants, especially foreigners, fighters of such a level (of commitment, ready to die), when Hezbollah expels them from very large geographical areas, it means that Hezbollah gains an offensive experience, a vast experience of liberation of territory through continuous and direct military operations, and not through guerrilla warfare. And Hezbollah did not have such experience before the war in Syria.
This is where Israel is frightened and terrified. Because what Hezbollah does in Syria, if a war is launched against it, it will do it in Galilee. […] If Hezbollah emerged from the (2006) July war as a regional power, it will emerge from this war (in Syria) as a true military power representing a force capable to liberate (huge) territories not only through guerrilla warfare, but even in a war that looks much more like the classic wars (between national armies).
Hezbollah is not Hamas, and believing that their strategies and tactics are the same while their abilities and experiences are immeasurable is both an illusion and a hoax to which, of course, Hassan Nasrallah did not deign reply.
Why was this show-operation launched now? Netanyahu, who is altogether Prime Minister, Minister of Defense, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Minister of Health, is more discredited than ever in Israel, because of the recent military failure against Gaza –after which his Minister of Defense Avigdor Lieberman resigned, almost taking down his government–, and of his innumerable legal probes, which led the Israeli police to ask, at the beginning of December, his indictment as well as that of his wife in an umpteenth corruption case. The Israeli opposition, from the first days, openly expressed doubts as to the true goals of the Operation “Northern Shield”, as did Tzipi Livni, who denounced the overdramatization of this operation:
We are not now in a situation where our soldiers are behind enemy lines. We are talking about engineering activity within the sovereign territory of the state of Israel. Netanyahu is blowing the incident out of proportion. He made a defensive engineering event into a dramatic military operation. This was done for one of two reasons — either the Prime Minister is himself panicking, or he wants to sow panic to justify his actions both in delaying elections and abandoning the residents of southern Israel [against the rockets of Gaza].
But we must not rely on the Western media to bring to our knowledge this easily accessible data. For them, only the official Israeli propaganda is worthy of credit.
More weak than ever, Netanyahu wants to present himself as a strong man against Hezbollah, but the operation launched against alleged tunnels, a preposterous maneuver to divert the attention of the Israeli press and public opinion, reveals only the powerlessness of Israel against the Party of God. Hezbollah is well aware that Netanyahu will not dare to launch a war of aggression against Lebanon, and that against Hezbollah, Israel has no other recourse than Washington’s sanctions and its own appeals to international institutions –these same institutions and laws trampled on by Tel Aviv for decades– to condemn the alleged violations of Israeli sovereignty by Hezbollah –while Israel continues to violate Lebanese airspace daily– and take action against him.
In the face of such childishness –the Israeli army is more likely to find Digletts and other underground Pokemon than operational tunnels of Hezbollah–, Hassan Nasrallah was wary not to provide any fuel to Netanyahu’s show: any speech on his part would have added credibility to this hyped pseudo-operation. Hezbollah media and Lebanese civilians took care of responding, widely ridiculing the operation, mocking Israel on social media, and picnicking with family on the border to taunt Israeli soldiers on the war footing.
A clip called “We’ll meet up in Haifa”, subtitled in Hebrew, was directed by a Lebanese artist, parodying an Israeli song. Hezbollah fighters can be seen reaching Haifa by tunnel, and spying on Netanyahu in his own home.
For its part, Hezbollah’s war media published a picture of Israeli troops taken from behind, inside Israeli territory, while they were facing the Lebanese border, thus proving that even when the enemy is on high alert, its territory remains easily accessible.
Moreover, Hezbollah fighters have stolen two FN MAG machine guns under the noses of Israeli soldiers (the Israeli media have widely reported this theft), weapons that will certainly reappear in their hands at the most opportune moment to humiliate the Israeli army and its government.
And on December 12, Hezbollah released this video subtitled in Hebrew and recalling the reality of the situation: it is Israel that fears Hezbollah and takes all measures to guard against it, not the other way around.
It is unlikely that the confrontation between Israel and Hezbollah will turn into war in the near future. But psychological warfare continues to rage, and the electronic battalions of Hassan Nasrallah demonstrate day after day their superiority.
An Iraqi anti-terror paramilitary group has pledged to stand by Hezbollah in the event of a war following recent Israeli operations near the Lebanese border.
“In the event of any war against Hezbollah, the movement is not going to be alone,” Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba spokesman Hashim al-Mousawi told Iran’s Tasnim news agency on Friday.
The group, simply known as Nujaba, is part of Hashd al-Sha’abi which is an umbrella counter-terrorism force gathering volunteer fighters from Iraq’s various ethnic groups, including Shias, Sunnis and Christians.
In the event of an attack on Lebanon’s Hezbollah, “all, including Nujaba, will be standing by its side,” Mousawi said.
Israel has recently launched an operation to destroy what it claims tunnels dug by Hezbollah into the occupied territories.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday warned that Hezbollah would be dealt “unimaginable blows” if it confronted the operation.
Hezbollah’s deputy secretary general Sheikh Naim Qassem warned last week that there is no spot across Israel outside the range of the Lebanese resistance movement’s missiles.
“Israel is not capable of confronting Hezbollah’s missiles. The Palestinian resistance is also advancing day by day. The resistance’s missile power is increasing,” Mousawi said.
He said a recent botched intelligence operation in the Gaza Strip in which a ranking Israeli officer was killed in clashes with Palestinian fighters showed Israel’s “obvious incapability.”
The incursion saw Hamas and other Palestinian resistance groups fire nearly 500 rockets into Israel during a two-day flare-up, forcing Tel Aviv to accept a hasty declaration of a ceasefire.
’US destabilizing Iraq-Syria border’
Al-Mousawi also said the United States is trying to create instability on the Iraqi-Syrian border by keeping the corridors used by terrorists open.
Washington, he said, keeps supporting terrorists along the passageways leading from its military base at the hugely-strategic al-Tanf border crossing.
The crossing lies at the intersection of Iraqi, Syrian, and Jordanian borders as well as the Wadi Hauran valley in the western Iraqi Anbar Province, where the US has built a sprawling military base.
Thousands of militants are trained at the base with the ultimate goal of toppling the government of President Bashar al-Assad.
“The US does not seek Daesh’s defeat and elimination. It seeks to keep Daesh as part of its international plans to target any country that opposes its policies,” Mousawi said.
“Daesh is a recruit and employee of the United States which uses the group for its special plans,” he added.
The Nujaba spokesman touched on the Syria developments, saying the US is “the main obstacle” to the Syrian army’s liberation of the last major terrorist bastion in the northwestern Idlib Province.
Idlib holds the largest concentration of militants and Takfiri terrorists, where Russia and Turkey have created a buffer zone to help end the violence there after the US prevented Syria from taking back the province.
Mousawi said the US is exploiting terrorist and armed groups depending on its own interests, adding whenever Washington perceives a political resolution is near, it resorts to obstructive efforts and stonewalling right away.
The US, he said, is pursuing its own political agenda in Syria, but American forces will not be able to remain in the country forever.
RAMALLAH – The US House of Representatives on Tuesday approved a bill that would target for sanctions Hamas resistance movement and Hezbollah over allegations of using civilians as human shields, guaranteeing that it will become law, JTA reported.
The bill describes Hamas and Hezbollah groups as “repeated” practitioners of an action that violates international law, claiming that Hamas routinely launches missiles at Israel from densely populated areas.
The US Senate unanimously passed the bipartisan bill in October.
The bill was authored by Senators Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Joe Donnelly (D-IN) and was co-sponsored by 50 other senators. It was first introduced this past summer.
“This critical and timely legislation mandates new sanctions against Hamas, Hezbollah and foreign state agencies that use civilians as human shields or provide support to those doing so,” the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) said in a statement Tuesday after the House passed the bill, which now goes to President Donald Trump for his signature.
Last February, the House of Representatives unanimously passed the Hamas Human Shields Prevention Act which condemns Hamas for the alleged use of civilians, including children, as human shields, sanctioning those who use them.
The act, however, emphasizes the efforts made by the Israeli occupation military to avoid civilian casualties, a claim that analysts said amounts to an attempt to whitewash Israeli crimes and terrorism against Palestinian civilians and unarmed protesters, including on the Gaza border.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has reminded Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of the need to maintain stability following the recent Israeli operations near the Lebanese border.
Speaking over the phone, Putin and Netanyahu discussed the Israeli operations, the Kremlin said in a statement on Sunday.
“The president of Russia stressed the importance of ensuring stability in the region,” the statement said.
Ties between Damascus and Tel Aviv have been strained since Russia’s delivery of the S-300 missile defense system to Syria following the September downing of a Russian spy aircraft during an Israeli airstrike.
Russia has blamed Israel for the incident, which killed 15 Russian crew members. The Defense Ministry has said Israeli jets used the Russian plane as cover to attack Syria.
In their late Saturday talks held at the initiative of Netanyahu, Putin told him that Israel must improve its military coordination with Russia, the Kremlin said.
The Russian leader also emphasized the importance of the upcoming talks between their military experts to examine the circumstances of the September incident.
Israel has recently deployed additional troops along Lebanon’s border under the pretext of “cutting off” Hezbollah tunnels near the occupied territories.
Netanyahu has boasted that the Israeli operation was “only a small piece of the big picture” of what he called efforts to ensure its security.
The operation has drawn rebuke and ridicule even from Israeli leaders, with opposition leader Tzipi Livni criticizing Netanyahu for overdramatizing the campaign “for political gain.”
“We are not now in a situation where our soldiers are behind enemy lines. We are talking about engineering activity …,” she said, accusing the Israeli premier of “blowing the incident out of proportion.”
Intelligence and transport minister Israel Katz said Friday that Israeli forces may need to go into Lebanon to deal with the alleged tunnels.
An Israeli incursion into Lebanon would likely spark a major confrontation with Hezbollah. The Lebanese resistance movement has warned that Israel would “regret” invading Lebanon.
In his talks with Netanyahu, Putin “stressed the importance of ensuring stability in the region in strict accordance with Resolution 1701 of the UN Security Council,” the Kremlin statement read.
He was referring to the 2006 UN Security Council resolution issued after the Second Lebanon War, the last major conflict between Israel and Hezbollah which ended with the victory of the Lebanese movement.
Lebanese Caretaker Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil ordered on Thursday the preparation of a complaint to the United Nations Security Council on the Israeli violations of Lebanese sovereignty.
National News Agency reported that Bassil has instructed Lebanon’s permanent representative to the UN, Ambassador Amal Mudallali, to submit a complaint against the Zionist entity on this matter.
The Lebanese complaint “comes in light of Israeli political and diplomatic campaign in preparation for a military aggression on Lebanon,” NNA quoted a statement by Lebanese Foreign Ministry as saying.
The statement also referred to Israeli violations of Lebanese Mobile network in which the Israeli occupation army sent voice messages to residents of southern town of Kfar Kela warning them of explosions in the Lebanese territory, according to the Lebanese agency.
The Foreign Ministry’s order follows an operation launched by Israel Tuesday to ‘cut off’ what it called ‘attack tunnels’ allegedly dug by Hezbollah in a bid to infiltrate into the Palestinian occupied territories.
In addition to the latest development on the southern border, the Zionist entity has been violating Lebanese airspace and territorial waters for years. A Lebanese Army official previously said that 162 Israeli violations were recorded in south Lebanon in September, including land and maritime infringements, as well as wall-building works, according to a Defense Ministry statement in October.
Commander of the Israeli military’s 300th Infantry Brigade has called on the Tel Aviv regime to resort to the policy of “targeted killings,” arguing that the assassination of the Secretary General of Hezbollah will deal a fatal blow to the Lebanese resistance movement.
Colonel Roy Levy, in an article published in the Hebrew-language Ma’arakhot magazine, which is affiliated to the Israeli army, wrote that “targeted killings” must be carried out, and that Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah should be killed by commando forces backed by the air force, the Hebrew-language Walla news website reported.
“His personality and military experience have turned him into a center of gravity. All of his organization – from senior commanders to the low-ranking soldiers – and thus the fighting spirit of the enemy will be harmed once he is targeted,” Levy wrote.
He then recommended Israeli military operations deep inside Lebanon, asserting that the offensives would yield many benefits despite the risks associated with them.
The Israeli military commander also called for “a proper positioning of combat commando units with the aim of subjugating the enemy.”
“Should we make a similar decision and kill the leaders of enemy organizations, for example, Nasrallah? The answer is not easy.
“But the idea of harming the enemy’s fighting spirit by damaging its property must be examined. We must adopt a policy not anchored in force, but in ruse instead. The deep activity of commandos in a way that surprises the enemy and strikes its equipment will be an important means of damaging its fighting morale, and will lead to its defeat,” Levy commented.
On November 28, 2017, the Israeli military’s chief spokesman said Nasrallah would be a target for assassination in any war between Israel and Hezbollah.
Ronen Manelis added that the Israeli military is conducting psychological and media warfare against Hezbollah.
“One of the things we talk about is the transition from traditional media consumption to social media,” Manelis said, adding, “We are also active in this theater, and it is an operational theater in every respect. Just in the past few weeks, we’ve taken a great many actions that caused consternation on the other side.”
“There won’t be a clear victory picture in the next war, though it’s clear that Nasrallah is a target,” he added.
Israel has officially admitted that its military ordered a deadly attack on a Lebanese ship carrying refugees during the regime’s invasion of the country more than three decades ago.
An Israeli submarine fired missiles at the refugee ship in northern Lebanon in the summer of 1982, killing 25 refugees and foreign workers on board, the Israeli Channel 10 reported on Thursday, after the regime lifted a 36-year-old gag order on the incident.
The report said that the commercial ship, carrying dozens of Lebanese refugees to Cyprus, apparently tried to take advantage of a brief ceasefire and flee the area.
But an Israeli Navy Gal-type submarine, which was following the ship for about an hour after leaving Tripoli, said the report, had fired torpedoes at the boat and killed the refugees and foreign workers.
It alleged that the submarine’s captain, identified as Maj. A, had mistakenly ordered the attack because he was convinced that the ship was carrying Palestinian fighters.
Ten years later, Israel said it had launched an investigation into the incident. The probe, however, ruled that the captain had made a mistake, but that he was within his operational orders.
Israeli armored personnel carriers are seen near a mosque on the outskirts of the Lebanese capital of Beirut, on June 16, 1982.
The Palestinians and the Lebanese never realized that the boat was sunk by Israeli.
The Israeli regime has waged three wars on Lebanon — in 1982, 2000, and 2006. It has also carried out assassinations in the Lebanese territory.
The Lebanese resistance movement, Hezbollah, which was founded in the 1980s following the Israeli invasion and occupation of southern Lebanon, has since helped the army defend Lebanon both in the face of foreign aggression, including in the 2000 and 2006 wars, and against terrorism.
Lebanon and Israel are technically at war due to the latter’s occupation of the country’s Shebaa Farms since 1967.
Almost immediately after the proxy war erupted, ISIS-tier footage of the torture and murder of Russians in Ukrainian custody emerged.
On July 6th, the New York Times published an astonishing investigation: In Ukraine, Killings of Surrendering Russians Divide an American-Led Unit. The article documents in grim detail how Chosen Company, an international volunteer battalion for Kiev, routinely executes Russian prisoners of war. It is the very first mainstream admission that this practice – a brazen breach of the Geneva Conventions, and a grave war crime – is widespread among Ukraine’s fighters, both foreign and homegrown. … continue
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The word “alleged” is deemed to occur before the word “fraud.” Since the rule of law still applies. To peasants, at least.
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