CIA personnel land in Lebanon, ramp up intel gathering to support Israel’s war
Photo credit: US Embassy Beirut
The Cradle | October 14, 2024
The CIA has sent additional agents to Lebanon and has increased its communications with Lebanese military, security, and political officials in an effort to obtain information about Hezbollah, and may have played a role in Israel’s recent attempt to assassinate a Hezbollah political leader, Al-Akhbar reported on 14 October.
Three senior officials in the official security services acknowledged that Western parties, primarily the US, have initiated intensive daily communication with all Lebanese military and security forces since the outbreak of the open war between Lebanon and Israel, Al-Akhbar editor Ibrahim al-Amin wrote.
The officials told Amin that the content of the communications had nothing to do with obtaining information about threats to western interests. Instead, they wish to obtain information about changes in Hezbollah’s political and military leadership structure after the recent assassination of the party’s secretary-general, Hassan Nasrallah.
US intelligence officials were very interested in whether Hezbollah leaders are “still communicating with the military, security and executive forces in Lebanon after the war, with questions about the form and content of the communication,” one official told Amin.
The same official revealed that a security team of 15 CIA officers arrived at Beirut airport last Thursday, 10 October, and moved in a convoy of armored cars without license plates to the headquarters of the American embassy in Awkar.
He explained that the team “joined the work cell based in one of the embassy wings in Beirut, to help manage the Beirut station, which includes 12 main officers, in addition to others with different specialties, including recruiting and managing agents, collecting information through technical means, and analyzing data.”
Another official told Amin that a new director for the CIA’s Beirut station, Sherry Baker, had been appointed and that Baker had previously participated in meetings with Lebanese security officials during visits to Washington.
The official said he knew of “five working visits by Lebanese officers of various levels to the United States, who held meetings with American intelligence officials at their headquarters in Langley.”
In this context, Amin reports that these contacts between the CIA and Lebanese security officials may have played a role in Israel’s recent attempt to assassinate a Hezbollah political leader, Wafiq Safa.
On 10 October, Israeli airstrikes leveled a residential building in central Beirut, killing 22 people. Israel stated that Safa was the target of the attack. However, they were unsuccessful in killing him.
One of the three officials revealed to Amin that just prior to the assassination attempt, the leadership of Hezbollah had asked Safa, in his capacity as head of the resistance movement’s Liaison and Coordination Committee, to communicate with a number of Lebanese security officials on matters related to the ongoing war.
The official explained that “the contacts took place despite the fact that the resistance knew that the mere occurrence of the phone call would constitute a security threat to Safa.”
These fears were confirmed when Israel carried out the bombing in Beirut and leaked news that the target was Safa.
The same official said that Hezbollah “estimates that American intelligence had a direct role in the attempt to assassinate Safa” and that “the operation was carried out based on information provided by the Americans.”
The official stated that the US wanted to kill Safa, who has no military role in Hezbollah, as part of a campaign launched by the US Ambassador to Beirut, Lisa Johnson, who recently “called on Lebanese political and non-political forces to begin working to establish the stage of “post-Hezbollah Lebanon.”
Do They Want American Troops to Die?
By Dan McAdams | Ron Paul Institute | October 14, 2024
Biden administration mismanagement—or worse—from day one of the latest Israeli multi-front war in the Middle East has led us to where we are today, at the brink of an all-out regional war with some 40,000 U.S. troops and multiple U.S. military bases in the region with targets on their back.
Biden’s blank check to Israel after the attacks of October 7, 2023, to launch multiple wars against its neighbors and carry out the mass murder of Palestinian civilians in Gaza has drawn the U.S. right into the middle of a bubbling cauldron of [World War III]. And rather than take a sober look at actual U.S. national security interests, Biden and his neocon incompetents are busy adding fuel to the fire hanging on to the pipe dream that they could do what they failed to do so many times before: remake the Middle East in their neocon image.
According to an article in Politico this past week, while Biden administration officials publicly urged restraint and a reduction in violence, they privately were working with the Israeli government to encourage a widening of Israel’s military operations to include its northern neighbor, Lebanon. Two top Biden administration officials, Amos Hochstein and Brett McGurk, urged Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to shift Israel’s military focus from the already-flattened Gaza northward to Lebanon.
As Politico reports:
“Behind the scenes, Hochstein, McGurk and other top U.S. national security officials are describing Israel’s Lebanon operations as a history-defining moment—one that will reshape the Middle East for the better for years to come.”
Where have we heard this kind of “let’s do war to re-shape the Middle East” argument before? As Wikileaks reminds us, appearing before the U.S. Congress in 2002 and urging the U.S. to attack Iraq, Netanyahu himself promised that “If you take out Saddam, Saddam’s regime, I guarantee you that it will have enormous positive reverberations on the region.”
Yeah, Bibi. How’d that work out for us?
So why is it that 22 years later senior U.S. officials are echoing Netanyahu’s bogus 2002 lies to draw the U.S. into another “history-defining” catastrophe in the Middle East? For Hochstein it might be that he is not the unbiased “honest broker” we need to keep us out of unnecessary war. After all, as The New York Times reminds us, Hochstein was born in Israel, had/has Israeli citizenship, and even served in the Israeli Defense Forces!
Now he is serving as President Biden’s top advisor for the Middle East—a position where it is critical to bring no personal biases to the table.
This should not automatically disqualify him from the position, of course, but just as with concerns over Victoria Nuland and Antony Blinken’s Ukrainian background, neocons pushing for war in the “old country” from which they should have left old allegiances behind should raise a few eyebrows.
McGurk is similarly compromised, as he is another Victoria Nuland/Zelig-like character [creature] who has spent his career weaseling into Republican and Democratic administrations as an “expert,” while his actual expertise comprises solely his adherence to the neocon ideology of all war all the time. He was on board for [George W.] Bush’s “remaking of the Middle East” to [Barack] Obama’s fake “Arab Spring to remake the Middle East” to [Donald] Trump’s “trash the Iran deal to remake the Middle East.”
The guy is a loser who has been wrong his whole career, with a trail of failures that would sink a normal person. But like the Energizer Bunny he just keeps on ticking and ticking toward yet another disaster.
As Politico goes on to note, the Hochstein/McGurk plan to urge Israeli attacks on Lebanon was not widely accepted among actual experts in the administration:
“The decision to focus on Hezbollah sparked division within the U.S. government, drawing opposition from people inside the Pentagon, State Department and intelligence community who believed Israel’s move against the Iran-backed militia could drag American forces into yet another Middle East conflict.”
Of course there is built into the Politico article the assumption that Hochstein and McGurk were at all concerned about “dragging American forces” into Israel’s regional war. In fact, their intent was the opposite. They no doubt yearned to draw the U.S. government into Israel’s regional war.
Which brings us to where we are today, with the Biden Administration committing more U.S. weapons systems and more U.S. military personnel to serve on the ground in Israel in its war against Gaza, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, and Iran. All at once. How’s that for neocon ambition?
As Pentagon Press Secretary Patrick Ryder announced [yesterday]: “At the direction of the President, @SecDef authorized the deployment of a Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) battery and associated crew of U.S. military personnel to Israel to help bolster Israel’s air defenses.”
With today’s [October 13] news that Lebanon successfully counter-attacked Israel—hitting an Israeli military base and taking out dozens of IDF soldiers—it appears certain that President Biden and his neocon-dominated foreign policy team are setting up U.S. military members to be killed in Israel to manufacture consent for a full-on US war against all of Israel’s enemies in the region.
They want American soldiers killed in Israel because they know the enormous propaganda value, particularly among a U.S. population that is increasingly against U.S. involvement in Israel’s wars and in favor of ending them instead.
With Kamala tanking in the eyes of a voting public increasingly unappetized by wilted word salads, an old-fashioned war might be just what the Biden brigades are cooking up to pull their chestnuts out of the fire.
With their track record of failure, it is time for those of us who are sane to be very, very worried.
This is going to get really bad really fast if we cannot get the attention of a slumbering—or worse—Congress.
Between Russia and Iran all is well that ends well
By M. K. BHADRAKUMAR | Indian Punchline | October 14, 2024
The mystery about the hastily-arranged ‘working meeting’ between Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Iranian counterpart Masoud Pezeshkian at Ashgabat, Turkmenistan, on Friday has only deepened after the event. This was their first-ever meeting. Putin didn’t even have the post-event presser.
Why such a meeting was considered necessary becomes an intriguing thought, as the two leaders are to meet in Kazan within days on the sidelines of the BRICS Summit on October 22-24.
Russia and Iran have had a difficult relationship through centuries. It still remains complicated, as the protracted negotiations over their strategic partnership treaty show. They have serious conflict of interests, as the controversial idea of Zangezur Corridor makes plain.
The two countries are potential competitors in Europe’s energy market. Both are tough practitioners of strategic autonomy. And their partnership in a future multipolar post-American century will have too many imponderables for an overall prediction.
At Ashgabat, Pezeshkian pointedly suggested to Putin that the signing of their proposed strategic treaty should be speeded up. Putin is known to have approved the draft agreement as far back as September 18. What is holding back the signing ceremony begs an explanation. Pezeshkian proposed that the ceremony could take place in Kazan. But the Russian side is dragging its feet.
Such ambivalence is reminiscent of the inordinate delay some years ago in Russia’s transfer of S-300 mobile surface-to-air missile system to Iran even after Tehran had made payment for the system. In sheer exasperation, Iran filed a $4 billion lawsuit against Russia’s defence export agency and embarked on the manufacture of its own long-range, mobile air defence system, the Bavar-373.
Russia was known to have come under US-Israeli pressure. Geopolitical considerations continue to prevail in Russia’s arms transfers with Iran. Pezeshkian, after his return to Tehran disclosed to the media that he had told Putin that Russia should “act more effectively in relation to the crimes committed by the Zionist regime in Gaza and Lebanon.”
Apparently, the tense exchange at Ashgabat provoked a frank remark later by Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov to Tass, the state news agency. Ryabkov said: “We are closely and anxiously following the events [in the Israel-Iran standoff], the risk of a large-scale conflict is indeed high. The tendency to escalate into a full-scale conflict is a real danger. We call on all parties to exercise restraint. We are in intensive dialogue with the countries of the region. And once again — a major war can be avoided, but everyone must show restraint.” [Emphasis added.]
Indeed, Moscow is pragmatically continuing with its ‘neutrality,’ which of course does not help Tehran. At the same time, Putin reportedly did not take a call recently from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu! Presumably, Russian-Israeli cogitations have gone underground.
That is understandable, as Russia keenly monitors the trajectory of the US-Israeli relationship. The paradox is, while powerful strikes on Iran’s infrastructure is impossible without US help and any Israeli plan to attack Iran would require preliminary discussions with the Pentagon, the Biden Administration is hoping with bated breath that Netanyahu keeps it in the loop about planned military actions.
On the other hand, the US’ willingness to assist in planning an offensive against Iran is also iffy. Nezavisimaya Gazeta newspaper quoted a Russian analyst Vladimir Frolov last week who used to be an employee of the Russian Embassy in the US: “I think Biden and company do not want an escalation [with Iran.] Israel’s relations with Biden are irreparably damaged. Netanyahu is just lying to him… Netanyahu is waiting for Donald Trump.”
That makes it twosome. Like the duo in the Samuel Beckett existential play Waiting for Godot, Putin and Netanyahu are waiting for Trump who may not even come at the end of the day. Committing one hundred percent to Iran, therefore, becomes problematic for the Kremlin. Then, there is the angst in Moscow about the intentions of the Pezeshkian government, which has prioritised the resumption of negotiations with the West.
Tehran noted carefully last week that the US officials went out of the way to affirm that despite tensions with Israel, Tehran is not ‘upgrading’ its nuclear doctrine. A spokesperson for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) in Washington added to the public remarks earlier in the week by CIA Director William Burns, who said the US had not seen any evidence of Iran’s Supreme Leader reversing his 2003 decision to suspend the [alleged] weaponisation programme.
Interestingly, Nournews, which is identified with the establishment, commented that the US intelligence assessment “could help explain the US opposition to any Israeli strike on Iran’s nuclear program in retaliation” — put differently, the US could still be keeping an eye on future nuclear negotiations with Iran.
At the Ashgabat meeting, Pezeshkian told Putin that Iran and Russia have good mutual and complementary potentials and can help each other. Pezeshkian stressed that Iran’s ties with Russia are “sincere and strategic.” He added, “Our positions on global matters are much closer to each other than to those of many other countries.”
According to the Kremlin transcript, Putin told Pezeshkian, “Our relationship with Iran is a priority for us, and it is developing very successfully… We are actively cooperating on the international arena, and often share close or even converging assessments of the ongoing developments.”
However, on his part, Pezeshkian remarked that “we must ensure that our relations improve and become stronger moving forward. We have many opportunities to achieve this objective, and it is our duty to assist one another in these efforts. We share similar visions, and there are many similarities in terms of our respective international standing.”
When it comes to the Ukraine conflict, Tehran’s stance is similar to India’s approach. Interestingly, in a post on X in the weekend, Iranian foreign minister Abbas Araghchi wrote that in his recent interactions in New York with top EU officials, he categorically told them “Iran-Russia military cooperation is not new; it has a history, long before the Ukrainian crisis began… I clearly said, and reiterate once again: we’ve NOT provided ballistic missiles to Russia. If Europe needs a case to appease Israel’s blackmail, better find another story.”
At the Ashgabat meeting, neither Putin nor Pezeshkian claimed a strategic convergence in their respective foreign policies. Pezeshkian, nonetheless, assured Putin that he looks forward to attending the upcoming BRICS summit and “we will do everything needed to approve and sign the documents on its agenda.”
Israel considers plan to starve Gaza’s civilians to death
Press TV – October 13, 2024
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is examining a plan to seal off humanitarian aid to northern Gaza in an attempt to starve out hundreds of thousands of Palestinians unwilling or unable to leave their homes.
Under the proposed plan, seen by the Associated Press, civilians who remain in northern Gaza would be classified as combatants, allowing Israeli troops to kill them. They would be denied access to food, water, medicine, and fuel.
The plan proposed to Netanyahu by a group of retired generals, calls for Israel to maintain control over the north for an indefinite period to attempt to create a new administration, splitting the Gaza Strip in two.
Israeli media reported that Netanyahu told a closed parliamentary committee session that he was considering the plan.
Israeli authorities with knowledge of the matter said parts of the plan are already being implemented.
The plan gave Palestinians a week to leave the northern third of the Gaza Strip, including Gaza City, before declaring it a closed military zone.
Israel has issued many evacuation orders for the north throughout the yearlong campaign of death and destruction, the most recent of which was Sunday.
Israeli forces widened their brutal military offensive on north Gaza early on Sunday, after killing 300 people over nine days in a ramped-up ground offensive targeting the Jabalia refugee camp.
Israeli tanks made their way to the north edge of Gaza City, while airstrikes from above continued.
Residents say they have been isolated from the rest of Gaza, with Israeli forces not allowing anyone to enter or exit the north.
No trucks of food, water, or medicine have entered the north since Sept. 30, according to the UN.
So far, very few Palestinians have heeded the latest evacuation order. Much fear there’s nowhere safe to go and that they will never be allowed back. Israel has prevented those who fled earlier in the war from returning.
“All Gazans are afraid of the plan,” said Jomana Elkhalili, a 26-year-old Palestinian aid worker for Oxfam living in Gaza City with her family.
“Still, they will not flee. They will not make the mistake again … We know the place there is not safe,” she said. “That’s why people in the north say it’s better to die than to leave.”
Philippe Lazzarini, head of the UN’s agency for Palestinian refugees, wrote on X Thursday that only about 100 Palestinians have fled the north since Sunday.
“At least 400,000 people are trapped in the area,” the UN official said “With almost no basic supplies available, hunger is spreading.”
Human rights groups say the plan would likely starve civilians and that it flies in the face of international law, which prohibits using food as a weapon and forcible transfers.
The fact that Israel is intentionally limiting food to Gaza is central to the genocide case brought against it at the International Court of Justice.
Israeli authorities say that if the strategy is successful in northern Gaza it could then be replicated in other areas, including tent camps further to the south sheltering hundreds of thousands of Palestinians.
When asked about the plan Wednesday, State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said the US, Israel’s main benefactor, was going to “make absolutely clear that it’s not just the United States that opposes any occupation of Gaza, any reduction in the size of Gaza, but it is the virtually unanimous opinion of the international community.”
The Israeli military presses ahead with its relentless bombardment of the besieged Gaza Strip now more than one year into the genocidal war.
The Israeli aggression on Gaza began in October last year, claiming the lives of more than 42,000 so far. Over 98,000 d others have also been injured since then.
Israeli Troops Breach Blue Line to Cross Into Lebanon, Forcibly Enter UN Base
Sputnik – 13.10.2024
UN peacekeepers in Lebanon saw Israeli troops breach the Blue Line that separates Israel from Lebanon on Sunday morning and force their way into a UN base at the southern Lebanese border village of Ramyah, in what the UN Interim Force In Lebanon (UNIFIL) described as a grave violation of international humanitarian law.
“Early this morning, peacekeepers at a UN position in Ramyah observed three platoons of IDF soldiers crossing the Blue Line into Lebanon,” the statement read.
While the peacekeepers were in shelters, two Israeli Merkava tanks destroyed the main gate to the UN position and entered there, the mission said, adding that the Israeli soldiers demanded that the base turn the lights off.
“Breaching and entering a UN position is a … flagrant violation of international law and Security Council resolution 1701 (2006). Any deliberate attack on peacekeepers is a grave violation of international humanitarian law and resolution 1701,” UNIFIL said.
Two hours later, the same UN base reported the firing of several rounds some 300 feet north of the position, which caused smoke to enter the camp and cause skin irritation and gastrointestinal symptoms in UN troops. They are receiving treatment, the mission said.
In a separate incident, Israeli soldiers denied passage to UNIFIL vehicles near the border Lebanese village of Meiss ej Jebel. The critical movement could not be completed, the mission said.
UNIFIL stressed that its mandate provided for freedom of movement in the area of operations and demanded that the Israeli military and other actors fulfill their obligations to ensure the safety and security of UN personnel and property and respect the inviolability of UN premises.
US troops will deploy to Israel – Pentagon
RT | October 13, 2024
The US has ordered the deployment of a THAAD air defense system to Israel, along with a crew of American service members to operate it, Pentagon Press Secretary Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder announced on Sunday. The move marks the first deployment of US combat troops on Israeli soil since the Israel-Hamas war began last year.
According to Ryder, the THAAD battery “and associated crew of US military personnel” will be stationed in Israel “to help bolster Israel’s air defenses following Iran’s unprecedented attacks against Israel on April 13 and again on October 1.”
US President Joe Biden, who the White House previously said had “no plans or intentions to put US boots on the ground in combat,” ordered the deployment, Ryder stated.
The THAAD, or Terminal High Altitude Area Defense system, is a mobile anti-ballistic missile system designed to detect and intercept ballistic missiles during their descent stage. It fires a non-explosive projectile at eight times the speed of sound, relying on kinetic energy to destroy incoming missiles.
A THAAD battery consists of 95 soldiers and six truck-mounted launchers capable of firing a total of 48 interceptors.
The US deployed a THAAD battery to Saudi Arabia after the Israel-Hamas war began last October, and to Israel on a training exercise in 2019. However, neither the system nor the American troops who operate it have been sent to Israel since the current conflict began.
While American soldiers took part in a brief aid mission off the coast of Gaza earlier this year, they did not set foot in the Palestinian enclave.
The deployment comes as Israel prepares its response to an Iranian missile attack on October 1, in which around 200 ballistic missiles were fired at Israeli military targets. Tehran maintains that the strike was a “legitimate” response to Israel’s assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran and Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah and a senior Iranian general in Beirut.
Israel is widely expected to target Iran’s oil or nuclear infrastructure, although the US has advised West Jerusalem against either choice. Whatever form the Israeli response takes, Iran has vowed to retaliate. Earlier this week, a source in Tehran told RT that this retaliation would be “proportionate.” Should West Jerusalem target Iran’s oil infrastructure, Tehran will respond by striking Israel’s oil refineries. Attacks on other infrastructure, such as power plants or nuclear facilities, will likewise prompt retaliatory strikes on corresponding installations in Israel, the source explained.
Hours before Ryder’s announcement, Iranian Foreign Minister Seyed Abbas Araghchi warned that the US is putting the “lives of its troops at risk by deploying them to operate US missile systems in Israel.”
“While we have made tremendous efforts in recent days to contain an all-out war in our region, I say it clearly that we have no red lines in defending our people and interests,” Araghchi added.”
Israeli Military and Police Raid International Home in Qusra
International Solidarity Movement | October 13, 2024
At about 20:00 Friday night, the Israeli army and police raided the international volunteers’ home in the village of Qusra, south of Nablus. This raid was conducted at gunpoint by a heavily armed force.
Leading the raid was the same military officer who had commanded a squadron that forced Palestinian harvesters out of their land in the village of Duma earlier in the day. During the raid, he pointed out specific volunteers to the police, saying he recognized them from earlier in the day.
The police broke into the house by destroying the door using a pneumatic hammer, and proceeded to search the premises without a search warrant, as well as the car of a Palestinian resident of Qusra who was there at the time. They demanded all the international activists present to show their passports, and photographed them.
Israeli law and police regulations only allow for police to require identification on the basis of suspicion of having broken the law, or for several specific reasons, which must be stated to those identified. The police had refused to state their grounds for either the search or identification, even declaring before they left, “You have done nothing wrong; we were only here to see who you are.”
The raid on the international volunteer quarters directly followed the forced removal of harvesters from their lands in the village of Duma earlier in the day, under the claim that it is forbidden for Palestinians to access their lands anywhere in Area C – which comprises around 60% of the West Bank – without prior coordination.
Smotrich: Israel’s future is ‘to expand to Damascus’
MEMO | October 13, 2024
Israel’s finance minister Bezalel Smotrich has acknowledged his aim for a Jewish state that not only encompasses all Palestinian territories but also extends to Syria, in the latest such open statement referring to Tel Aviv’s potential pursuit of a ‘Greater Israel’ project.
In an interview for a documentary produced and aired by the French-language channel Arte, titled ‘Israel: Extremists in Power’, Smotrich stated that “I want a Jewish state… that operates according to the values of the Jewish people”.
He was then posed the question of whether Israel aims to extend its sovereignty which currently “starts at the [Mediterranean] sea and ends at the [Jordan] river”, to which he smiled and said “okay, bit by bit”.
Smotrich stated that “it is written that the future of Jerusalem is to expand to Damascus”, adding ominously “only Jerusalem, until Damascus”. The documentary then detailed the Israeli finance minister’s plan – and that of other extremist and right-wing Israelis – to have Israeli statehood extend into Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, Syria, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia.
His comments come at a time when Israel continues to bombard Lebanon and launch its ground invasion, with many illegal Jewish settler groups advocating for Israeli forces to remain in Lebanon and settle the country. Efforts have steadily been made on that front, an example being a childrens’ book which was recently published on the Israeli occupation of Lebanon.
Although the Israeli government itself has kept the scope of its aims on defeating the Iran-backed Lebanese group Hezbollah, and has not formally announced any plans to occupy Lebanon and settle Jewish immigrants on newly-conquered territory.
The views of government figures such as Smotrich, however, as well as their significant support base, increasingly ignite concerns that Tel Aviv could potentially possess the goal of expanding Israeli territory in the Middle East via conquest of surrounding Arab states.
Netanyahu orders UN to evacuate Lebanon peacekeepers
RT | October 13, 2024
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has demanded that UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres withdraw UNIFIL peacekeepers from southern Lebanon, adding that by remaining there they are “providing a human shield to Hezbollah terrorists.”
In a Hebrew-language video message posted to social media on Sunday, Netanyahu told Guterres “it is time for you to withdraw UNIFIL from Hezbollah strongholds and from the areas of combat.”
“The IDF has repeatedly asked for this, and has been met with repeated refusals, all aimed at providing a human shield to Hezbollah terrorists,” he continued.
UNIFIL, or the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon, was formed in 1978 to oversee the withdrawal of Israeli forces to below the so-called ‘blue line’, which separates Lebanon from Israel and the occupied Golan Heights. Headquartered in the town of Naqoura, UNIFIL is currently composed of around 10,000 troops from around 50 countries, who are tasked with monitoring the demilitarization of southern Lebanon between the blue line and the Litani River.
Israel maintains that UNIFIL has done nothing to prevent Hezbollah entrenching itself in this region, while preventing its own forces from responding to the threat. In the weeks since the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) crossed the blue line and entered southern Lebanon, UNIFIL has claimed that Israeli forces have repeatedly hit its bases and outposts.
Four Sri Lankan and Indonesian peacekeepers were injured on Thursday and Friday when Israeli tanks fired on their watchtowers, UNIFIL said. Another was hit by gunfire at Naqoura later on Friday, although UNIFIL said that it could not identify the origin of the fire. IDF bulldozers have demolished UNIFIL walls and bunkers, while a contingent of Irish peacekeepers found themselves surrounded by Israeli tanks earlier this week when they refused the IDF’s demand that they leave their outpost.
Switching to English, Netanyahu told Guterres to “get the UNIFIL forces out of harm’s way. It should be done right now, immediately.”
“Your refusal to evacuate the UNIFIL soldiers makes them hostages of Hezbollah,” he continued, warning that “this endangers both them and the lives of our soldiers.”
UNIFIL has refused to withdraw from its positions, and in a joint statement on Saturday, 40 countries contributing to the mission called on Israel to investigate the attacks on peacekeepers. One day earlier, the leaders of France, Italy, and Spain expressed “outrage” at the attacks, and accused Israel of violating UN Security Council resolution 1701, which states that its forces cannot operate in southern Lebanon.
Netanyahu said that Israel “regrets” injuring the peacekeepers, but added that the “simple and obvious” way to prevent further bloodshed is “just get them out of the danger zone.”
Israel escalated its military campaign against Hezbollah last month, pounding Beirut with a wave of airstrikes including one that killed the group’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah. A ground invasion followed, and the death toll in Lebanon currently stands at over 2,100, according to the country’s Health Ministry. The IDF has acknowledged the deaths of two dozen of its soldiers in Lebanon, although Hezbollah insists that the true scale of Israel’s losses is far higher.
Exposing US Foreign Policy in Middle East | Gary Vogler Interview
Counter Currents | October 12, 2024
Gary Vogler, who spent eight years working with the Pentagon’s Iraq oil team and even briefly served as the country’s oil minister, joins host and former CIA analyst Larry Johnson to discuss the following issues:
- Role of oil in Iraq War
- US occupation of Syrian oil fields
- Israel’s oil dependence vulnerability
The Zionist regime cannot fight Hamas and Hezbollah at the same time
By Robert Inlakesh | Al Mayadeen | October 12, 2024
The war that the Israeli regime has opened will not close until it is dealt a strategic defeat, one from which it will not likely recover.
After all of its gloating, the Zionist entity appears to have fallen for its own propagandistic bravado and is sleepwalking into the abyss. Having failed to defeat Hamas in Gaza, the Israelis appear to have lulled themselves into a belief that they had already crushed Hezbollah with their initial blows of the war.
When the Israelis detonated thousands of pagers on September 17, a day later detonating walkie-talkie devices, inflicting dozens of deaths and hundreds of serious injuries, this represented a momentary tactical victory for the settler project. What followed, with the assassination of countless Hezbollah officials, culminating in the martyrdom of the party’s Secretary-General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, made the Israelis appear as if they were then in the driver’s seat of the conflict.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu grew so confident and emboldened that he decided to record a video message to the people of Iran, indicating that he would soon aid in carrying out a regime change. The Zionist leaders ordered large-scale airstrikes against thousands of targets across Lebanon, devastating civilian infrastructure and inflicting over 2,000 deaths. The Israelis repeatedly pounded the Southern Suburb of Beirut with hundreds of tons of explosives, while expanding the nature of their strikes against Syrian territory too.
While the Arab and Muslim World entered a stage of collective mourning over the repeated attacks on Lebanon, processing the loss of one of its most cherished leaders in recent memory, the Israelis also decided to declare a ground incursion into South Lebanon. Terrorist tactics and assassinations have served as propaganda victory in the media battle of the optics, in addition to a temporary tactical victory, which certainly inflicted a blow.
Yet, the strategic initiative was suddenly recovered on October 1, with the Islamic Revolution Guard Corps (IRGC)’s unprecedented response to the repeated assassinations – including the murder of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran – firing 180 ballistic missiles at Israeli military sites. Despite countless attempts to deflect, cover up, and downplay the effectiveness of the Iranian response, dubbed “Operation True Promise II,” the impact was felt throughout the entire region.
What also happened following this, with the repeated successful strikes against Israeli targets by Yemen’s Ansar Allah and the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, combined with repeated Hezbollah’s successes in repelling the Zionist forces’ attempts at penetrating Lebanese land, all worked at changing the direction of the tide. On October 7, Hamas demonstrated its ability to hit “Tel Aviv” with M90 rockets, which was followed by strikes on “Tel Aviv” by Ansar Allah and then Hezbollah.
After repeated costly failures along the Lebanese border, the Israelis then decided to invade Jabalia Refugee Camp in northern Gaza and begin a terror bombing campaign across northern Gaza, also carrying on its assassinations of journalists and educators in the besieged territory. However, despite the terror that they inflicted, when their forces entered on the ground and besieged Jabalia Refugee Camp, the Palestinian Resistance factions began executing sophisticated and daring ambush operations, exacting a significant price on their soldiers.
The al-Qassam Brigades – the armed wing of Hamas – then began firing drones at troop formations and even one toward Israeli settlements, indicating that their capabilities were much greater than they were previously believed to be by the enemy. Suddenly, the Israelis were in a position where the Palestinian Resistance was killing and injuring their soldiers in Gaza, while Hezbollah was doing the same from South Lebanon.
Although the Israelis dealt significant blows to the Axis of Resistance, it is now in an even more difficult position than it previously found itself in prior to its assaults on Lebanon. Hezbollah has replaced its military leadership and has had the time to plan, rid itself of potential security breaches, and take the initiative on the battlefield. We see that Hezbollah is today intensifying its rocket strikes against the Israelis, dealing significant blows and putting the Zionist entity in a position of embarrassment before its own public once again.
The Israelis now must mount significant offensive actions across all fronts and fight on, managing a battle with Lebanon, Gaza, the West Bank, Yemen, Iraq, and even Iran. Benjamin Netanyahu envisioned himself as the Israeli Prime Minister to inflict a 1967-style defeat on the regional resistance, yet he has dragged the entire entity into something very different. We are no longer in the days of Egyptian President Gamal Abdul Nasser or the PLO in the 1980s, Hezbollah and the regional Axis of Resistance axis are not an alliance that can be broken through assassinations of senior leaders, in addition to this, they are ready for the fight.
Hezbollah undoubtedly enjoys superiority on the ground, in face-to-face combat, while the Zionist military has only proven capable of pulling off sophisticated terrorist plots and assassinations, in combination with their elite video-game warriors who specialize in using advanced weapons from a distance. The reality is that typing on a keyboard or commanding controllers, while sitting in a fortified position, may deliver some tactical victories, but it will not win a war that requires immense physical courage, which the Israelis simply do not possess.
Even in the West Bank, where the Israelis frequently raid refugee camps and face off against poorly trained teenagers and men in their young twenties, armed with no more than light weapons, their special forces units have to call in backup and end up using air support. Even against the weakest link in the chain of Resistance groups, they struggle to hold ground in confrontations and never do so in a fair way. In Lebanon, they face committed, well-trained, and well-prepared fighters who do not fear death and crave the opportunity to confront them.
The Israeli regime may well pull off more trickery and terrorism on a grand scale, as it will turn to more assassinations, attempts to stir unrest, and perhaps special force operations deep into Lebanese or Syrian territory. There cannot be any doubt that there will be more challenges ahead, that the Israelis have many more tricks up their sleeves, and that the terror they plan to inflict will be painful, primarily to civilians. Yet, they do not possess the capability to win a multi-front confrontation and will be bled to death, so long as the Axis of Resistance continues to seize the initiative and respond forcefully to each escalatory violation of international law that the Israelis commit.
Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, in his first speech issued during the Gaza Genocide, spoke of “scoring points” and that the “knockout blow” had not yet been delivered against the Israeli regime. What has happened during the past month is that the Israelis were being beaten on points and decided to begin throwing haymaker punches with the intent of ending the fight abruptly, taking a chance at victory. Some of those punches landed and knocked down the Axis of Resistance, yet they got back on their feet, dealt blows back to the Israelis, and are now fighting with even more intensity. Both sides have been hit and hurt, so this fight now looks like it will end with a KO.
The war that the Israeli regime has opened will not close until it is dealt a strategic defeat, one from which it will not likely recover. It is also a war that the United States has enabled and backed in every way. In today’s world, the Palestinians and Lebanese people are taking on not only the Zionists, but the US too.
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Israel’s recurring use of terror on civilians
By Bob Finch | January 26, 2009
Insanely disproportionate use of violence against unarmed civilians… continue
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