English LCCC Newsbulletin For Lebanese, Lebanese Related, Global News & Editorials
For September 30/2024
Compiled & Prepared by: Elias Bejjani
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Bible Quotations For today
Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Matthew 24/32-44: ‘‘From the fig tree learn its lesson: as soon as its branch becomes tender and puts forth its leaves, you know that summer is near. So also, when you see all these things, you know that he is near, at the very gates. Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away. ‘But about that day and hour no one knows, neither the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. For as the days of Noah were, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day Noah entered the ark, and they knew nothing until the flood came and swept them all away, so too will be the coming of the Son of Man. Then two will be in the field; one will be taken and one will be left. Two women will be grinding meal together; one will be taken and one will be left. Keep awake therefore, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming. But understand this: if the owner of the house had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into. Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour.

Titles For The Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on September 29-30/2024
Elias Bejjani/Text & Video: The Nero of Lebanon, Hassan Nasrallah, Burns the Country from His Hidden Bunker
Hezbollah Confirms a 7th Top Commander Was Killed in Israeli Strikes in Recent Days
24 People Killed in Israeli Attack on Ain Deleb, Lebanon’s Health Ministry Says
Israel Used US-made Bomb in Attack on Hezbollah Head, US Senator Says
Nasrallah’s Killing Reveals Depth of Israel’s Penetration of Hezbollah
Small Israeli ‘border movements’ into Lebanon may have begun
Militants Killed and Wounded in Eastern Syria, Media and War Monitor Say
Lebanese Minister: Diplomatic Efforts for Ceasefire with Israel Underway
Tachles with Aviel – Nasrallah is dead! Finally!
Apartment building in Beirut hit as Israel widens air campaign
Lebanon cannot become the next Gaza: Australia warns the U.N.
Canada announces $10 million for humanitarian assistance in Lebanon
An Israeli airstrike hits central Beirut for the first time in nearly a year of conflict
Lebanon faces humanitarian ‘catastrophe’ as Britons urged to leave
U.S. airstrikes on Syria kill 37 militants affiliated with extremist groups
Trump escalates attacks on Harris' mental fitness and suggests she should be prosecuted
French FM in Beirut, despite air strikes: ministry
Frankly Speaking: Is a new civil war inevitable in Lebanon?
Iran mourns Nasrallah with ‘strategic patience’ and empty rhetoric/BARIA ALAMUDDIN/Arab News/September 30, 2024
Aside from Israel, Lebanon needs to be protected from another enemy: itself/FAISAL J. ABBAS/Arab News/September 29, 2024

Titles For The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on September 29-30/2024
Netanyahu at UNGA: ‘No place in Iran the long arm of Israel cannot reach’
Biden: Nasrallah’s death ‘a measure of justice’ for his victims
Israeli airstrikes kill 11 Palestinians in Gaza
Israel Strikes Houthi Targets in Yemen, Killing at Least Four People
Israel Bombs Yemen Port, Power Stations After Houthi Attacks
Iran's president denounces Israeli attacks on Tehran's regional allies
News Analysis: Iran faces deep quandary over how to respond to Israel

Titles For The Latest English LCCC analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources on September 29-30/2024
A War of Choice and a War of Necessity/Amir Taheri/Asharq Al Awsat/September 29/2024
The Brink of an Expansive War and the Absence of Strategic Containment/Dr. Abdelhak Azzouzi/Asharq Al Awsat/September 29/2024
Slaughter in Bangladesh and the International Cover-Up/Vijay Patel/Gatestone Institute/September 29, 2024
Netanyahu Ratchets Up Challenge to Iran With Nasrallah Death/Dan Williams, Peter Martin and Sam Dagher/Bloomberg/September 29, 2024

The Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on September 29-30/2024
Elias Bejjani/Text & Video: The Nero of Lebanon, Hassan Nasrallah, Burns the Country from His Hidden Bunker
Elias Bejjani/September 28/2024
https://eliasbejjaninews.com/2024/09/134984/
The satanic, terrorist, and Persian-backed Hezbollah has turned Lebanon into a ticking time bomb, with the Shiite communities bearing the brunt of its destructive ambitions. Hezbollah’s reckless stockpiling of weapons and ammunition in civilian areas has placed the entire country, particularly the Shiite regions, on the brink of catastrophe. Israel, fully aware of these explosive caches, has begun detonating them, resulting in devastating explosions that are killing hundreds of innocent civilians.
Nasrallah, the criminal mastermind, has laced residential areas with death traps, even in the neighborhoods he claims as part of his "Shiite stronghold" in the southern suburbs, Bekaa, and the South. Israel’s strikes are igniting these Hezbollah warehouses, and fires are engulfing the surroundings. As of today, the death toll is expected to soar into the thousands, with many victims still buried beneath the rubble, their lives extinguished by Hezbollah’s greed and Iran's sinister influence.
Nasrallah, Lebanon’s Nero, may very well meet his end in this fiery chaos, buried deep in his bunker as Lebanon burns above him. His downfall, however, will not absolve the devastation he and his Iranian handlers have wrought upon Lebanon, particularly the Shiite community that he falsely claims to protect.

Hezbollah Confirms a 7th Top Commander Was Killed in Israeli Strikes in Recent Days
Asharq Al Awsat/September 29/2024
The Israeli military said Sunday it has killed another high-ranking Hezbollah official in an airstrike as the Lebanese group was reeling from a string of devastating blows and the killing of its overall leader, Hassan Nasrallah. The military said Nabil Qaouq, the deputy head of Hezbollah's Central Council, was killed on Saturday. Hezbollah confirmed his death, making him the seventh senior Hezbollah leader slain in Israeli strikes in a little over a week. They include founding members who had evaded death or detention for decades.The Israeli military said it carried out another targeted strike on Beirut later on Sunday, with details to follow. Hezbollah had earlier confirmed that Ali Karaki, another senior commander, died in Friday's strike that killed Nasrallah. The Israeli military said earlier that Karaki was killed in the airstrike, which targeted an underground compound in Beirut where Nasrallah and other senior Hezbollah figures were meeting. Israel says at least 20 other Hezbollah militants were killed in the strike, including two close associates of Nasrallah, one of whom was in charge of his security detail.
Wreckage from the strike was still smoldering more than two days later. On Sunday, Associated Press journalists saw smoke over the rubble as people flocked to the site, some to check on what’s left of their homes and others to pay respects, pray or simply to see the destruction.
White House national security spokesman John Kirby said Sunday that Israel's airstrikes had “wiped out” Hezbollah’s command structure, but he warned the group will work quickly to rebuild it. “I think people are safer without him walking around,” Kirby said of Nasrallah. “But they will try to recover. We’re watching to see what they do to try to fill this leadership vacuum. It’s going to be tough. … Much of their command structure has now been wiped out.”
Kirby, who spoke during an appearance on CNN’s “State of the Union,” sidestepped questions about whether the Biden administration agrees with how the Israelis are targeting Hezbollah leaders. The White House continues to call on Israel and Hezbollah to agree to a 21-day temporary ceasefire that was floated by the US, France and other countries last week as world leaders gathered for the UN General Assembly. Earlier this month, Hezbollah was also targeted by a sophisticated attack on its pagers and walkie-talkies that was widely blamed on Israel. A wave of Israeli airstrikes across large parts of Lebanon has killed at least 1,030 people — including 156 women and 87 children — in less than two weeks, according to Lebanon's Health Ministry.
Hundreds of thousands of people have been driven from their homes in Lebanon by the latest strikes. The government estimates that around 250,000 are in shelters, with three to four times as many staying with friends or relatives, or camping out on the streets, caretaker Environment Minister Nasser Yassin told the AP. Hezbollah has continued to fire rockets and missiles into northern Israel, but most have been intercepted or fallen in open areas. No Israelis have been killed since the latest wave of strikes targeting top Hezbollah leaders began on Sept. 20. Qaouq was a veteran member of Hezbollah going back to the 1980s and served as Hezbollah's military commander in southern Lebanon during the 2006 war with Israel. He often appeared in local media, where he would comment on politics and security developments, and he gave eulogies at the funerals of senior fighters. The United States announced sanctions against him in 2020. Hezbollah began firing rockets, missiles and drones into northern Israel after Hamas' Oct. 7 attack out of Gaza triggered the war there. Hezbollah and Hamas are allies that consider themselves part of an Iran-backed “Axis of Resistance” against Israel. Israel has responded with waves of airstrikes, and the conflict has steadily ratcheted up to the brink of all-out war, raising fears of a region-wide conflagration. Israel says it is determined to return some 60,000 of its citizens to communities in the north that were evacuated nearly a year ago. Hezbollah has said it will only halt its rocket fire if there is a ceasefire in Gaza, which has proven elusive despite months of indirect negotiations between Israel and Hamas led by the United States, Qatar and Egypt.

24 People Killed in Israeli Attack on Ain Deleb, Lebanon’s Health Ministry Says
Asharq Al Awsat/September 29/2024
Lebanon’s Health Ministry said on Sunday at least 24 people were killed in Israeli airstrikes that hit two buildings in the country’s south. The consecutive strikes Sunday on Ain all-Delb, east of Sidon, were caught on camera by neighbors in the area. The Health Ministry said the strikes also injured at least 29 people. In video verified by The Associated Press, one strike caused a huge plume of smoke. The second one hit an adjacent building, causing to sway and then collapse. Separately, the Health Ministry said Israeli strikes in the northern province of Baalbek Hermel killed 21 people and injured at least 47. Israel struck more targets in Lebanon on Sunday, pressing Hezbollah with new attacks after killing the Iran-backed group's leader, Hassan Nasrallah, and a string of its other top commanders in an escalating military campaign. The attacks have dealt a stunning succession of blows to Hezbollah after almost a year of cross-border fire, killing much of its leadership and revealing gaping security holes. Israel's defense minister is now discussing widening the offensive. Following the death of Nasrallah - killed in a massive airstrike in Beirut on Friday - Hezbollah fired new fusillades of rockets into Israel, while Iran said his death would be avenged. Israel's intensifying bombardment has increased fears the conflict could spin out of control, potentially drawing in Iran as well as the United States, Israel's closest ally, which said on Sunday it has authorized its military to reinforce in the region while also urging a diplomatic resolution.
Nasrallah had not only made Hezbollah into a powerful domestic force in Lebanon during his 32 years as leader, but helped turn it into the linchpin of Iran's network of allied groups in the Arab world. Nasrallah's body was recovered intact from the site of Friday's strike, a medical source and a security source told Reuters on Sunday. Hezbollah has not yet said when his funeral will be held.
Supporters of the group and other Lebanese who hailed its role fighting Israel, which occupied south Lebanon for years, mourned him on Sunday. "We lost the leader who gave us all the strength and faith that we, this small country that we love, could turn it into a paradise," said Lebanese Christian woman Sophia Blanche Rouillard, carrying a black flag to work in Beirut. The fighting between Hezbollah and Israel, their latest round of warfare in four decades of on-off conflict, has been waged in parallel with Israel's war in Gaza against Hamas since the Iran-backed Palestinian group's attack on Israel last Oct. 7.
Israel's stated goal is to make its northern areas safe from Hezbollah rocket fire and allow thousands of displaced residents to return, but its strikes have also had a devastating impact on civilians in Lebanon. Lebanon's Health Ministry said more than 1,000 Lebanese were killed and 6,000 wounded in the past two weeks, without saying how many were civilians. The government said a million people - a fifth of the population - had fled their homes. The Health Ministry said 14 medics had been killed in airstrikes over the past two days. In Beirut, some displaced families spent the night on the benches at Zaitunay Bay, a string of restaurants and cafes on Beirut's waterfront. On Sunday morning, families with nothing more than a duffle bag of clothes had rolled out mats to sleep on and made tea for themselves. "You won't be able to destroy us, whatever you do, however much you bomb, however much you displace people - we will stay here. We won't leave. This is our country and we're staying," said Francoise Azori, a Beirut resident jogging through the area. The UN World Food Program began an emergency operation to provide food for those affected by the conflict.
MILITARY ACTION
On Sunday Israel's military said the air force had struck dozens of targets including launchers and weapons stores while its navy said it had intercepted eight projectiles coming from the direction of Lebanon and one from the Red Sea. More blasts rocked Beirut and drones could be heard flying over all parts of the Lebanese capital overnight and throughout the day on Sunday. Nasrallah's death capped a traumatic fortnight for Hezbollah, starting with the detonation of thousands of communications devices used by its members. Israel was widely assumed to have carried out that action but has not confirmed or denied it did. Israeli airstrikes across Hezbollah strongholds in south Lebanon, the Bekaa Valley near the Syrian border, and in Beirut's southern suburbs have meanwhile killed a string of the group's other most senior commanders.
On Sunday Israel said it had killed Nabil Qaouq, a prominent Hezbollah leader. Hezbollah confirmed his death.
ESCALATION RISKS
Concerns have grown about the prospect of a wider conflict. Israel has mobilized reserve brigades and says it is ready for all options, including a ground operation. Hezbollah has said it will cease fire only when Israel's offensive in Gaza ends. Hamas and other Hezbollah allies issued statements mourning his death. Diplomatic efforts have shown little sign of progress. Lebanon's caretaker Information Minister Ziad Makary said during a cabinet meeting on Sunday that efforts for a ceasefire were still underway. The US, which has praised the killing of Nasrallah as a measure of justice for victims of Hezbollah attacks, on Sunday urged a peaceful resolution. White House national security spokesperson John Kirby said all-out war with Hezbollah or Iran would not help residents of northern Israel return to their homes. "We believe that a diplomatic path is the right course," he said. In Iran, which helped create Hezbollah in the early 1980s, senior figures mourned the death of a senior Revolutionary Guards member killed alongside Nasrallah, and Tehran called for a UN Security Council meeting on Israel's actions. Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei was moved to a secure location in Iran after Nasrallah's killing, sources told Reuters. Hezbollah's arsenal has long been a point of contention in Lebanon, a country with a history of civil conflict. Hezbollah's Lebanese critics say the group has unilaterally pulled the country into conflicts and undermined the state.

Israel Used US-made Bomb in Attack on Hezbollah Head, US Senator Says
Asharq Al-Awsat/September 29/2024
The bomb that Israel used to kill Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in Beirut last week was an American-made guided weapon, a US senator said on Sunday. Mark Kelly, chair of the Senate Armed Services Airland Subcommittee, said Israel used a 2,000-lb (900-kg) Mark 84 series bomb, during an interview with NBC. His statement marks the first US indication of what weapon had been used. "We see more use of guided munitions, JDAMs, and we continue to provide those weapons," Kelly said, using an abbreviation that stands for Joint Direct Attack Munitions. "That 2,000-pound bomb that was used, that's a Mark 84 series bomb, to take out Nasrallah," he said. The Israeli military said on Saturday it had eliminated Nasrallah in a strike on the group's central command headquarters in Beirut's southern suburbs. The Israeli military has declined to comment on what weapons were used in the attack. The Pentagon was not immediately available for comment. JDAMs convert a standard unguided bomb using fins and a GPS guidance system into a guided weapon. The US is Israel's longtime ally and biggest arms supplier.

Nasrallah’s Killing Reveals Depth of Israel’s Penetration of Hezbollah
Reuters/September 29/ 2024
In the wake of Hassan Nasrallah's killing, Hezbollah faces the enormous challenge of plugging the infiltration in its ranks that allowed its arch enemy Israel to destroy weapons sites, booby-trap its communications and assassinate the veteran leader, whose whereabouts had been a closely guarded secret for years. Nasrallah's killing in a command HQ on Friday came barely a week after the deadly detonation of thousands of booby-trapped Hezbollah pagers and hundreds of radios - attacks widely blamed on Israel but which it has not claimed. His assassination was the culmination of a rapid succession of strikes that have eliminated half of Hezbollah's leadership council and decimated its top military command. In the days before and hours after Nasrallah's killing, Reuters spoke to more than a dozen sources in Lebanon, Israel, Iran and Syria who provided details of the damage Israel has wrought on the powerful Shiite armed group, including to its supply lines and command structure. All asked for anonymity to speak about sensitive matters. One source familiar with Israeli thinking told Reuters, less than 24 hours before the strike, that Israel has spent 20 years focusing intelligence efforts on Hezbollah and could hit Nasrallah when it wanted, including in the headquarters. The person called the intelligence "brilliant," without providing details. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his close circle of ministers authorized the attack on Wednesday, two Israeli officials told Reuters. The attack took place while Netanyahu was in New York to speak at the UN General Assembly. Nasrallah had avoided public appearances since a previous 2006 war. He had long been vigilant, his movements were restricted and the circle of people he saw was very small, according to a source familiar with Nasrallah's security arrangements. The assassination suggested his group had been infiltrated by informants for Israel, the source said. The leader had been even more cautious than usual since the Sept. 17 pager blasts, out of concern Israel would try to kill him, a security source familiar with Hezbollah's thinking told Reuters a week ago, citing his absence from a commanders' funeral and his pre-recording of a speech broadcast a few days before. Hezbollah's media office did not respond to a request for comment for this story. US President Joe Biden on Saturday called Nasrallah's killing "a measure of justice" for his many victims, and said the United States fully supported Israel's right to defend itself against Iranian-backed groups. Israel says it carried out the hit on Nasrallah by dropping bombs on the underground headquarters below a residential building in southern Beirut. "This is a massive blow and intelligence failure for Hezbollah," Magnus Ranstorp, a veteran Hezbollah expert at the Swedish Defense University. "They knew that he was meeting. He was meeting with other commanders. And they just went for him." Including Nasrallah, Israel's military says it has killed eight of Hezbollah's nine most senior military commanders this year, mostly in the past week. These commanders led units ranging from the rocket division to the elite Radwan force. Around 1,500 Hezbollah fighters were maimed by the exploding pagers and walkie talkies on Sept. 17 and Sept. 18. On Saturday, Israel's military spokesperson Lieutenant Colonel Nadav Shoshani told reporters in a briefing that the military had "real-time" knowledge that Nasrallah and other leaders were gathering. Shoshani did not say how they knew, but said the leaders were meeting to plan attacks on Israel. Brigadier General Amichai Levin, commander of Israel's Hatzerim Airbase, told reporters that dozens of munitions hit the target within seconds.
"The operation was complex and was planned for a long time," according to Levin.
DEPLETED
Hezbollah has shown the ability to replace commanders quickly, and Nasrallah's cousin Hashem Safieddine, also a cleric, has long been tipped as his successor. "You kill one, they get a new one," said a European diplomat of the group's approach.
The group, whose name means Party of God, will fight on: by US and Israeli estimates it had some 40,000 fighters ahead of the current escalation, along with large weapons stockpiles and an extensive tunnel network near Israel's border. Founded in Lebanon in 1982, the group is the most formidable member of Iran's so-called Axis of Resistance of anti-Israel allied irregular forces. But it has been materially and psychologically weakened over the past 10 days. Thanks to decades of backing from Iran, prior to the current conflict Hezbollah was among the world's most well-armed non-conventional armies, with an arsenal of 150,000 rockets, missiles and drones, according to US estimates. That is ten times the size of the armory the group had in 2006, during its last war with Israel, according to Israeli estimates. Over the past year, even more weapons have flowed into Lebanon from Iran, along with significant amounts of financial aid, a source familiar with Hezbollah's thinking said. There have been few detailed public assessments of how much this arsenal has been damaged by Israel's offensive over the past week, which has hit Hezbollah strongholds in Bekka Valley, far from Lebanon's border with Israel. One Western diplomat in the Middle East told Reuters prior to Friday's attack that Hezbollah had lost 20%-25% of its missile capacity in the ongoing conflict, including in hundreds of Israeli strikes this week. The diplomat did not provide evidence or details of their assessment. An Israeli security official said "a very respectable portion" of Hezbollah's missile stocks had been destroyed, without giving further specifics. In recent days, Israel has struck more than 1,000 Hezbollah targets. The security official, when asked about the military's extensive target lists, said Israel had matched Hezbollah's two-decade build up with preparations to prevent it launching its rockets in the first place - a complement to the Iron Dome air defense system that often downs missiles fired at the Jewish state. Israeli officials say the fact that Hezbollah has only been able to launch a couple of hundred missiles a day in the past week was evidence its capabilities had been diminished.
IRAN CONNECTION
Before the strike on Nasrallah, three Iranian sources told Reuters Iran was planning to send additional missiles to Hezbollah to prepare for a prolonged war. The weapons that were to be provided included short-to-medium-range ballistic missiles including Iranian Zelzals and an upgraded precision version known as the Fateh 110, the first Iranian source said. Reuters was unable to reach the sources after the Nasrallah assassination. While Iran is willing to provide military support, the two Iranian sources said it does not want to be directly involved in a confrontation between Hezbollah and Israel. The rapid escalation in hostilities over the past week follows a year of skirmishes tied to the Gaza war. Iranian Revolutionary Guards' deputy commander Abbas Nilforoushan was killed in the Israeli strikes on Beirut on Friday, Iranian media reported on Saturday, citing a state TV report.
Hezbollah may need certain warheads and missiles along with drones and missile parts to replenish those destroyed by Israeli strikes across Lebanon last week, a senior Syrian military intelligence source added. Iranian supplies have in the past reached Hezbollah by air and sea. On Saturday, Lebanon's transport ministry told an Iranian aircraft not to enter its airspace after Israel warned air traffic control at Beirut airport that it would use "force" if the plane landed, a source at the ministry told Reuters.
The source said it was not clear what was on the plane.
Land corridors are currently the best route for missiles, parts and drones, through Iraq and Syria, with the help of allied armed groups in those countries, an Iranian security official told Reuters this week. The Syrian military source, however, said Israeli drone surveillance and strikes targeting convoys of trucks had compromised that route. This year, Israel stepped up attacks on weapons depots and supply routes in Syria to weaken Hezbollah ahead of any war, Reuters reported in June. As recently as August, an Israeli drone hit weapons concealed in commercial trailers in Syria, the source said. This week, Israel's military said its warplanes bombed unspecified infrastructure used to transfer weapons to Hezbollah at the Syria-Lebanon border. Joseph Votel, a former Army general who led US forces in the Middle East, said Israel and its allies could well intercept any missiles Iran sent by land to Hezbollah now. "That might be a risk they're willing to take, frankly," he said.

Small Israeli ‘border movements’ into Lebanon may have begun
Joshua Marks/Israel Today/September 29/2024
Possible operations to remove Hezbollah positions in preparation for a limited ground incursion may be underway.
Israel may have already begun small-scale cross-border incursions in preparation for a possible ground operation in Lebanon, ABC News reported overnight Saturday, citing two U.S. officials.The officials stressed that Jerusalem appears to have not yet decided to send tanks and troops over the Blue Line to begin major activities to clear the area of Hezbollah terrorists so as to allow the return of more than 60,000 evacuated residents of northern Israel to their homes. However, “border movements” into Lebanon to remove Hezbollah positions near the frontier may have begun or are about to, the officials said.
U.S. officials made similar remarks to CNN overnight Saturday, with one telling the Atlanta-based broadcaster that the American assessment was based on the mobilization of Israel troops on the Lebanese border and the clearing of areas. Any such operation will likely be limited in scope, the sources stressed to the American news networks, with the aim to fulfill the recently added war goal of safely bringing back internally displaced citizens after nearly a year of constant rocket, missile and drone attacks by Hezbollah’s Iranian-back terrorist army in support of Hamas in Gaza.
Earlier on Saturday, Israel Defense Forces spokesperson Lt. Col. (res.) Peter Lerner said that the army was preparing for a possible ground incursion, as an option under consideration.
Late on Saturday, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant held an “operational situation assessment regarding the expansion of IDF activities in the northern arena,” his office said. IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi announced on Sept. 25 that the military was preparing a possible ground operation in Lebanon to remove the threat posed by Hezbollah. “You can hear the planes above us; we are attacking all day. Both to prepare the area for the possibility of your entry [into Lebanon], and also to continue harming Hezbollah,” Halevi told troops during a drill.“To achieve the goal of safely returning residents to their abandoned homes in the north, we are preparing the [ground] maneuver,” the general said. In another sign that Israel is preparing for a possible escalation with Hezbollah in Lebanon, the 98th Paratroopers Division recently moved from the Gaza Strip to the northern front.
The 98th Division joined the 36th Armored Division under the Northern Command after months of fighting Hamas terrorists in Gaza under the Southern Command.
Asked by reporters on Saturday in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, about a possible Israeli ground offensive in Southern Lebanon, U.S. President Joe Biden said, “It’s time for a ceasefire.”The U.S. last week voiced opposition to a Israeli ground maneuver in Southern Lebanon to push Hezbollah terrorists away from the border. “We obviously do not believe that a ground invasion of Lebanon is going to contribute to reducing tensions in the region, to preventing an escalatory spiral of violence,” a senior American official told AFP on Sept. 23. The official said that the United States was against IDF troops crossing the border as it works on a diplomatic “off-ramp” to the escalating conflict between Israel and Hezbollah. A U.S. official told Axios on Saturday, a day after Hezbollah’s long-time leader Hassan Nasrallah died in an Israeli airstrike in Beirut, that avoiding an Israeli ground incursion is now the Biden administration’s top priority, as well as preventing direct Iranian involvement and reaching a diplomatic resolution that returns residents to their homes in northern Israel and Southern Lebanon. Biden’s comments to the press on Saturday came hours after Halevi confirmed Nasrallah’s death. Israeli fighter jets bombed Hezbollah’s headquarters in Dahiyeh, in the Beirut’s southern suburbs, killing Nasrallah and other senior terrorists, including Ali Karaki, the commander of Hezbollah’s Southern Front, and Iranian Revolutionary Guards deputy commander Brig. Gen. Abbas Nilforoushan. The Iranian general was the IRGC’s regional replacement for Mohammad Reza Zahedi, who was killed in an Israeli attack in Damascus in April, prompting Tehran’s first-ever direct offensive against Israel, in which some 300 missiles and drones were fired at the Jewish state, with nearly all intercepted and one person wounded.
Israel asks U.S. to deter Iran
Jerusalem has asked Washington to take steps to deter Tehran from responding to Friday’s strike in Beirut, Axios reported on Saturday, citing two Israeli and U.S. officials. In a statement released on Saturday, Biden said that he directed Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin to “further enhance the defense posture of U.S. military forces in the Middle East region to deter aggression and reduce the risk of a broader regional war.”According to sources cited by ABC News, U.S. officials were given at most a “few minutes notice” before Friday’s attack that killed Nasrallah.
This short notice reportedly angered Austin, who said that he spoke to his Israeli counterpart Gallant while the operation, dubbed “New Order,” was already underway. “We do bear a lot of risks” in the Middle East region, the officials said, and the Americans were concerned about possible hostile responses and the lack of time to prepare. One of the officials emphasized the importance of maintaining communication between Washington and Jerusalem because U.S. “interests in the region could be badly harmed” if contacts are cut off. The sources said that right up until his assassination, Nasrallah continued to demand an end to fighting in Gaza as a condition for a ceasefire in the north. These officials also claimed that only diplomacy can provide a long-term solution, even if an Israeli military campaign in Lebanon makes preparations for it. United Nations Security Council Resolution 1701, which ended the 2006 Second Lebanon War, was supposed to prevent Hezbollah from arming itself and posing a threat to Israel south of the Litani River, but it was never enforced on the Lebanese side.

Militants Killed and Wounded in Eastern Syria, Media and War Monitor Say
Asharq Al Awsat/September 29/2024
A number of militants were killed and wounded in eastern Syria early Sunday near a strategic border crossing with Iraq in apparent airstrikes, pro-government media and an opposition war monitor reported. Pan-Arab television network Al-Mayadeen cited unnamed sources saying that at least eight Syrians were killed in the strike by the Bou Kamal crossing in Israeli airstrikes. It was unclear how they confirmed Israeli jets were behind the strikes. Meanwhile, Britain-based opposition war monitor the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said five airstrikes killed at least 15 militants, among them leaders, and wounded at least 20 others. The Observatory said the strikes targeted headquarters and warehouses in the city of Deir Ezzor and surrounding towns. Pro-government radio station Sham FM said that prior to the blasts heard in Deir Ezzor, explosions were heard at a US military base in northeastern Syria following rocket and drone attacks. None of the reports could be independently verified. The US military’s Central Command, which has launched airstrikes on Iranian military personnel and Tehran-backed militant groups in Syria’s eastern Deir Ezzor province, didn’t immediately return a request for comment. The Israeli military doesn’t usually acknowledge its strike on Syria. However, when it does so, it says it targets Iran-backed militants.

Lebanese Minister: Diplomatic Efforts for Ceasefire with Israel Underway
Asharq Al Awsat/September 29/2024
Lebanon's Information Minister Ziad Makary said during a cabinet session on Sunday that diplomatic efforts for a ceasefire with Israel were underway. "It is certain that the Lebanese government wants a ceasefire, and everyone knows that (Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu went to New York based on the premise of a ceasefire, but the decision was made to assassinate Nasrallah," Makary said. The death of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah was confirmed on Saturday, heightening tensions between Lebanon and Israel after months of conflict along their shared border, said Reuters.
"Diplomatic efforts to achieve a ceasefire are ongoing. The Prime Minister is not falling short, but the matter is not that easy," he added.

Tachles with Aviel – Nasrallah is dead! Finally!
Aviel Schneider/Israel Today/September 29/2024
The Israeli army officially announced the death of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah on Shabbat today. And this is being celebrated in Israel. We also toasted with a glass of wine at the Shabbat table. Le’Chaim!
Shortly after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu finished his speech to the United Nations General Assembly in New York, there was an explosion in Beirut. In the world media, no one was concentrating on Netanyahu’s speech and rhetoric to the nations. Everything was focused on the Shiite terror stronghold of Dahieh in Beirut. The command center of the Shiite terrorist militia in underground bunkers looked as if a meteor had struck it. Then the photo was circulated of Netanyahu on the phone somewhere in the UN building on American soil, giving the green light to bomb Hassan Nasrallah. Even as he was addressing the nations, the thought was floating in his head that in a few minutes or hours Hassan Nasrallah would disappear from this earth and be sent to hell. An even fuller fledged multi-front war may break out because of this. However, Iran also sees what has happened to Hamas and Hezbollah since October 7. Negotiating with the enemy only when they beg for negotiations, not before. Until then, Israel must keep striking. Finally, the Israeli security apparatus is operating as the people wanted from the beginning – taking the initiative.
Hezbollah leader Nasrallah declared, in his first public speech after the October 7 attack in the south, that the attack proved that Israel was “weaker than a spider’s web.” The “spider web” is turning out to be resilient, having survived almost twelve bloody months of war, and having given Hamas and Hezbollah a good beating. Only together can we win, and our enemies fantasize that Israel is as weak as a spider web because of the divisions in Israeli society. It is not the Zionist entity that will soon disappear, as Nasrallah often emphasized in his speeches. It seems that he and his entire leadership are gone once and for all.
In his speech to the nations, Netanyahu reminded the world of what he said last year at the United Nations General Assembly, a few days before October 7.
“I said we faced the same timeless choice that Moses put before the people of Israel thousands of years ago as we were about to enter the promised land. Moses told us that our actions will determine whether we bequeath to future generations a blessing or a curse. And that is the choice we face today – the curse of Iran’s unremitting aggression or the blessing of a historic reconciliation between Arab and Jew. In the days that followed that speech the blessing I spoke of came into sharper focus. A normalization deal between Saudi Arabia and Israel seemed closer than ever, but then came the curse of October 7th.”
Hassan Nasrallah, the Secretary General of Hezbollah, is not just another leader of a terrorist organization, and his elimination is not comparable to the killing of a high-ranking member of the military wing of Hamas or Hezbollah. His death is a huge earthquake in the Middle East and the entire world of terror, the extent of which is difficult to estimate at this time. For Hezbollah, it is an unprecedented loss, since the organization’s most important figure since its founding is no longer there. For Iran, it is also an unprecedented loss, since its most important agent outside Iranian borders no longer exists. And it is a heavy blow to all terrorist organizations that saw in Nasrallah the man who could defeat Israel and reduce it to a “spider web” – until Friday.
In the West, politicians are scratching their heads and thinking that Israel has gone mad. Josep Borrell, the European Union’s foreign minister, said after the Israeli attacks in Dahieh, Beirut: “We are exerting all diplomatic pressure to achieve a ceasefire, but it seems that no one can stop Netanyahu.”
It is true that Israel is going crazy. In Hebrew we say: “The landlord has gone mad.” Finally. But it is not Netanyahu who must be stopped. It is not Israel who must be stopped. Israel will not and cannot stop now.
Finally, Netanyahu is reacting as the vast majority of Israelis had hoped. The enemy must be mercilessly defeated. Western governments do not understand what a favor Israel has done the West by fighting Islamist terrorist militias such as Hezbollah and Hamas.
What the US government in Washington fears is that Israel’s war in the Middle East will spoil the upcoming elections for Kamala Harris and the Democrats. Everything else is secondary. The fact that 70,000 Israelis have been displaced from Northern Israel for a year due is not an issue at all for Western governments. They still believe that diplomacy can solve everything. They are wrong. War is a tool of diplomacy, and Israel must continue to use it. Negotiate while waging war, not during a ceasefire. Negotiating during a ceasefire accomplishes nothing, except making the French and the EU happy, and helping Hezbollah and Hamas. Such negotiations do not help Israel.
The West and the EU do not even understand the difference between Israel and Hezbollah, between good and evil, between blessing and curse. Sometimes it is better to remain silent than to talk nonsense. The West should not belittle those who have the courage to fight Islamic terror. In Lebanon and Syria; Sunni Muslims, but also Christians and Druze are celebrating the elimination of Nasrallah in Lebanon by Israel. We showed this on our Telegram channel.
Nasrallah was more than a terrorist. He was a pioneer of politics, terrorism and the connection between the two. At the age of just 32, he was unexpectedly appointed Secretary General of the terrorist group, succeeding Abbas al-Musawi, who was also killed by Israel, in 1992. He quickly became a rising star in international terrorism, but also on the political map of the entire Arab and Muslim world, and especially Lebanon. Hezbollah destroyed the harmony in Lebanon and plunged the land of cedars into a political and economic abyss over the past 30 years, just as the PLO under its leader Yasser Arafat had done in the 1970s until the Israeli invasion in 1982. Back then it was to stop the Katyusha rocket attacks, and to drive the PLO out of Lebanon. The same scenario has now repeated itself.
In many ways, Nasrallah has succeeded in changing the region, especially the face of Lebanon. Under his leadership, Hezbollah developed from a small, isolated militia into a military empire with influence over forces in Syria, but also in Yemen and Iraq.
The Syrian civil war in 2011 prompted Nasrallah to make a dramatic decision: he sent troops to rescue Bashar al-Assad. His fighters fought on all fronts, against both the jihadists of ISIS and the moderate Syrian opposition. Hezbollah also began operating in Yemen, Iraq, Bahrain and around the world. Under Nasrallah, Hezbollah became one of the largest drug cartels in the world and established so-called narco-terrorism – the drug trade to finance terrorist attacks. Nasrallah spread the idea among many Muslims around the world that Israel was as weak as a spider’s web. But Nasrallah’s arrogance became his trap. Over the past year, he made one mistake after another and failed to read the political map correctly. The most serious mistake was his solidarity with Hamas and the decision to attack Israel on October 8, 2023. Nasrallah was convinced that Israel was too weak and too divided to risk a massive attack on Hezbollah. Now he is paying the price for his arrogance.
In conclusion, we are really facing dramatic and exciting times, and Israel really has no choice but to eliminate the terror and missile threat in the south and north once and for all, or at least drastically reduce it.
It is possible that Iran itself will again attack Israel, but not inevitable. Israel knows that war can break out. The bigger problem is the West, which wants to prevent Israel from continuing in this manner, and threatens with an arms embargo. Even if the West does not agree with Israel’s war on terror and Iran, it should at least not prevent Israel from destroying the terrorist militias. After all, that is in the interests of all people who want to live in freedom. But if you can’t choose between Israel and Hezbollah, you can’t choose between a blessing and a curse. Netzach Israel lo Yeschaker – The eternity of Israel does not lie!

Apartment building in Beirut hit as Israel widens air campaign
Maya Gebeily and Laila Bassam/Reuters/September 29, 2024
BEIRUT (Reuters) - An apartment building in Beirut was hit by an Israeli airstrike on Monday, according to Reuters witnesses, in the first attack within city limits as Israel escalated hostilities against Iran's allies in the region. The strike hit the upper floor of an apartment building in the Kola district of Lebanon's capital, Reuters witnesses said. A security source told Reuters that at least two people were killed. There was no immediate comment from Israel's military. Israel's increasing frequency of attacks against the Hezbollah militia in Lebanon and the Houthi militia in Yemen have prompted fears that Middle East fighting could spin out of control and draw in Iran and the United States, Israel's main ally. Israel on Sunday launched airstrikes against the Houthi militia in Yemen and dozens of Hezbollah targets throughout Lebanon after earlier killing the Hezbollah leader.
The Houthi-run health ministry said at least four people were killed and 29 wounded in airstrikes on Yemen's port of Hodeidah, which Israel said were a response to Houthi missile attacks. In Lebanon, authorities said at least 105 people had been killed by Israeli air strikes on Sunday.
Lebanon's Health Ministry has said more than 1,000 Lebanese have been killed and 6,000 wounded in the past two weeks, without saying how many were civilians. The government said a million people - a fifth of the population - have fled their homes.
The intensifying bombardment over two weeks has killed a string of top Hezbollah leaders, including its leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah. Israel has vowed to keep up the assault and says it wants to make its northern areas secure again for residents who have been forced to flee by Hezbollah rocket attacks.
Israeli drones hovered over Beirut for much of Sunday, with the loud blasts of new airstrikes echoing around the Lebanese capital. Displaced families spent the night on benches at Zaitunay Bay, a string of restaurants and cafes on Beirut's waterfront.
Many of Israel's attacks have been carried out in the south of Lebanon, where the Iran-backed Hezbollah has most of its operations, or Beirut's southern suburbs. Monday's attack in the Kola district appeared to be the first strike within Beirut's city limits. Syrians living in southern Lebanon who had fled Israeli bombardment had been sleeping under a bridge in the neighborhood for days, residents of the area said. The United States has urged a diplomatic resolution to the conflict in Lebanon but has also authorised its military to reinforce in the region.
U.S. President Joe Biden, asked if an all-out war in the Middle East could be avoided, said “It has to be." He said he will be talking to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Lebanon cannot become the next Gaza: Australia warns the U.N.
Reuters/September 29/2024
"It was an attack that cannot and should not be justified. Like many countries, Australia has imposed sanctions on Hamas, its leaders and financial facilitators. In Israel's response, more than 40,000 Palestinians have been killed, more than 11,000 children. Nearly two million Gazans displaced, some many times over. More than 2 million facing acute food insecurity. This must end. Palestinian civilians cannot be made to pay the price of defeating Hamas. All lives have equal value.""It is now nearly 300 days since Australia and 152 other countries voted for a ceasefire. And today I repeat that call just as I repeat Australia's call for a ceasefire in Lebanon and for parties to fully implement resolution 1701. Lebanon cannot become the next Gaza."Wong's comments came as a wave of air raids hit Beirut's southern suburbs early on Saturday (September 28), after a massive strike on the Iran-backed movement's command center that apparently targeted leader Hassan Nasrallah. Reuters witnesses heard more than 20 airstrikes before dawn on Saturday. Abandoning their homes in the southern suburbs, thousands of Lebanese congregated in squares, parks and sidewalks in downtown Beirut and seaside areas.

Canada announces $10 million for humanitarian assistance in Lebanon
The Canadian Press/Sat, September 28, 2024
OTTAWA — Canada is contributing $10 million for humanitarian assistance for civilians in Lebanon amid the escalating conflict between Israel and Hezbollah. International Development Minister Ahmed Hussen announced the funds Saturday in a news release, which says the money will help provide things like food, water, and emergency healthcare, including sexual and reproductive healthcare. It says the funding is in addition to the US$10 million already allocated to the crisis in Lebanon by the UN Central Emergency Response Fund, to which Canada is a donor.
Hezbollah, which Canada considers a terrorist organization, confirmed on Saturday that its leader and one of its founding members was killed in an Israeli airstrike in a southern suburb of Beirut. Israel has vowed to step up pressure on Hezbollah until it halts its attacks that have displaced tens of thousands of Israelis from communities near the Lebanese border. The news release that announced Canada's humanitarian funding also calls for an immediate 21-day ceasefire across the Lebanon-Israel border. “With the funding announced today, Canada’s partners will be able to scale up their efforts to help people in urgent need," Hussen said in the news release. "We call for an end to the violence in Lebanon and for all parties to protect civilians and humanitarian workers from harm and to respect their obligations under international humanitarian law." Hezbollah started firing rockets on Israel in support of Gaza on Oct. 8, a day after Hamas militants launched an unprecedented attack on Israel, killing some 1,200 people and abducting another 250. The release said Canada continues to monitor the situation in Lebanon and remains in close contact with humanitarian partners to assess and respond to evolving needs.
"Canada stands in solidarity with the people of Lebanon affected by this conflict, and we’re committed to helping provide them with the humanitarian assistance they need," Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly said in the news release. This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 28, 2024.

An Israeli airstrike hits central Beirut for the first time in nearly a year of conflict
Melanie Lidman And Kareem Chehayeb/JERUSALEM (AP)/September 29, 2024
The first apparent Israeli airstrike on central Beirut in nearly a year of conflict leveled an apartment building early Monday, hours after Israel hit targets across Lebanon and killed dozens of people as Hezbollah sustained heavy blows to its command structure, including the killing of its leader, Hassan Nasrallah.
The airstrike hit a multi-story residential building, according to an Associated Press journalist at the scene. Videos showed ambulances and a crowd gathered near the building located in a mainly Sunni district with a busy thoroughfare lined with shops.
An official with Lebanese Civil Defense, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media, said at least one person was killed in the strike and 16 people injured. The person killed was a member of the al-Jamaa al-Islamiya, or the Islamic Group, a Sunni political and militant group that is allied with Hezbollah, he said. In the past week, Israel has frequently targeted Beirut’s southern suburbs, where the militant group Hezbollah has a strong presence - including a major strike on Friday that killed Nasrallah - but had not hit locations near the city center. Monday's strike marked the first on Beirut's center in nearly a year of conflict between Israel and Hezbollah,
There was no immediate comment from Israeli officials.
Earlier, Hezbollah confirmed that Nabil Kaouk, the deputy head of the militant group’s Central Council, was killed Saturday, making him the seventh senior Hezbollah leader slain in Israeli strikes in a little over a week. They include founding members who had evaded death or detention for decades. Hezbollah also confirmed that Ali Karaki, another senior commander, died in an airstrike Friday strike that killed Nasrallah. Israel says at least 20 other Hezbollah militants were killed, including one in charge of Nasrallah's security detail. The Lebanese health ministry documented at least 105 people killed around the country in airstrikes Sunday. Two strikes near the southern city of Sidon, about 45 kilometers (28 miles) south of Beirut, killed at least 32 people, the Lebanese health ministry said. Separately, Israeli strikes in the northern province of Baalbek Hermel killed 21 people and injured at least 47. There were other strikes. The Israeli military previously said it also carried out another targeted strike on Beirut, but did not immediately provide details. Lebanese media reported dozens of strikes in the central, eastern and western Bekaa and in the south, besides strikes on Beirut. The strikes have targeted buildings where civilians were living and the death toll was expected to rise. In a video of a strike in Sidon, verified by The Associated Press, a building swayed before collapsing as neighbors filmed. One TV station called on viewers to pray for a family caught under the rubble, posting their pictures, as rescuers failed to reach them. The Lebanese health ministry reported at least 14 medics were killed over two days in the south. President Joe Biden said Sunday he would speak soon with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and believes that an all-out war in the Middle East must be avoided. “It has to be,” Biden told reporters at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware as he boarded Air Force One for Washington, though he didn't say when he would call the Israeli leader. Meanwhile, wreckage from the strike on Friday that killed Nasrallah was still smoldering. AP journalists saw smoke over the rubble as people flocked to the site, some to check on what was left of their homes and others to pay respects, pray or simply to see the destruction. In response to the dramatic escalation in Israeli strikes on Lebanon, Hezbollah significantly increased its attacks in the past week, from several dozen to several hundred daily, the Israeli military said. The attacks injured several people and caused damage, but most of the rockets and drones were intercepted by Israel’s air defense systems or fell in open areas. The army says its strikes have degraded Hezbollah’s capabilities and the number of launches would be much higher if Hezbollah had not been hit.
Israel strikes Houthi targets in Yemen
Also on Sunday, the Israeli military said dozens of its aircraft struck Houthi targets in Yemen in response to a recent attack on Israel. The military said it targeted power plants and sea port facilities in the city of Hodeida. The Houthis launched a ballistic missile attack on Ben Gurion airport on Saturday when Netanyahu was arriving. The Houthi media office said the Israeli strikes hit the Hodeida and Rass Issa ports, along with two power plants in Hodeida city, a stronghold for the Iranian-backed rebels. The Houthi-run Health Ministry said the strikes killed four people and wounded 40 others. The Houthis claimed they took precautionary measures ahead of the strikes, emptying oil storages in the ports, according to Nasruddin Ammer, deputy director of the Houthi media office. He said in a post on X that the strikes won’t stop the rebels’ attacks on shipping routes and on Israel.
U.S. warns Hezbollah will work quickly to rebuild
Meanwhile, White House national security spokesman John Kirby said Israel's airstrikes in Lebanon had “wiped out” Hezbollah’s command structure, but he warned the group will work quickly to rebuild it. “I think people are safer without him walking around,” Kirby said of Nasrallah. “But they will try to recover. We’re watching to see what they do to try to fill this leadership vacuum. It’s going to be tough. … Much of their command structure has now been wiped out.”Speaking on CNN’s “State of the Union,” Kirby sidestepped questions about whether the Biden administration agrees with how the Israelis are targeting Hezbollah leaders. The White House continues to call on Israel and Hezbollah to agree to a 21-day temporary cease-fire floated by the U.S., France and other countries as world leaders gathered for the U.N. General Assembly last week.
Netanyahu adds former rival to his Cabinet
Netanyahu on Sunday appointed a former rival, Gideon Saar, to his Cabinet. The move expands Netanyahu’s governing coalition and helps entrench the Israeli leader in office. Under their agreement, Netanyahu said Saar would be given a spot in the Security Cabinet, the body that oversees management of the ongoing war. Saar had hoped to replace Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, another rival of Netanyahu’s. But a deal to become defense minister fell through after fighting intensified with Hezbollah.
Airstrikes drive thousands from homes in Lebanon
Earlier this month, Hezbollah was also targeted by a sophisticated attack on its pagers and walkie-talkies that was widely blamed on Israel. A wave of Israeli airstrikes across large parts of Lebanon have killed more than 1,030 people — including 156 women and 87 children — in less than two weeks, according to Lebanon's Health Ministry. Hundreds of thousands of people have been driven from their homes in Lebanon by the latest strikes. The government estimates around 250,000 are in shelters, with three to four times as many staying with friends or relatives, or camping out on the streets.
Hezbollah, a Lebanese militant group and political party backed by Iran, Israel’s chief regional rival, rose to regional prominence after fighting a devastating monthlong war with Israel in 2006 that ended in a draw. Kaouk was a veteran member of Hezbollah going back to the 1980s and served as Hezbollah's military commander in southern Lebanon during the 2006 war with Israel. The United States announced sanctions against him in 2020. Hezbollah began firing rockets, missiles and drones into northern Israel after Hamas' Oct. 7 attack out of Gaza triggered the war there. Hezbollah and Hamas are allies that consider themselves part of an Iran-backed “Axis of Resistance” against Israel. The conflict has steadily ratcheted up to the brink of all-out war, raising fears of a region-wide conflagration. Israel says it is determined to return some 60,000 of its citizens to communities in the north that were evacuated nearly a year ago. Hezbollah has said it will only halt its rocket fire if there is a cease-fire in Gaza, which has proven elusive despite months of indirect negotiations between Israel and Hamas led by the United States, Qatar and Egypt.

Lebanon faces humanitarian ‘catastrophe’ as Britons urged to leave
Christopher McKeon, PA Political Correspondent/PA Media/September 29/2024
Britons have been urged to leave Lebanon amid warnings the country faces a humanitarian “catastrophe” following the latest round of Israeli air strikes.On Friday, the Foreign Office warned that British nationals should “leave now” as series of massive explosions levelled multiple apartment buildings in Beirut.
In a statement, the Foreign Office said it was “working to increase capacity” and secure seats for British nationals on flights out of the country. Friday’s strikes have been reported to be an attempt to kill Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, and were followed by further strikes on southern Beirut overnight, prompting civilians to move north in an effort to find safety. On Saturday, the Israeli government said it had killed Ms Nasrallah, with the Israeli Defence Forces posting on X, formerly Twitter, he would “no longer be able to terrorise the world”.
Ettie Higgins, Unicef’s deputy representative in Lebanon, said “thousands and thousands” of people had fled southern Beirut, while hospitals were “overwhelmed” and water pumping stations had been destroyed.
She told the BBC’s Today programme: “Even the most basic essential services of healthcare and water are now being rapidly, rapidly depleted. “There was already a humanitarian crisis in Lebanon given that it’s been hosting over 1 million refugees from Syria for over a decade, so it’s rapidly escalating into a catastrophe.”She added that 50 children had already been killed, and said she expected that figure to rise as the air strikes continued. Israel has insisted the air strikes have targeted Hezbollah military installations or senior figures, with Friday’s attack said to have targeted the main Hezbollah headquarters.
The latest round of strikes will have further dampened hopes of an international ceasefire in the region, coming shortly after Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu promised his country’s campaign against Hezbollah would continue during an address to the UN.
Western governments have expressed concern that the intensified conflict between Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah could trigger a wider regional war, with figures including Sir Keir Starmer and US President Joe Biden calling for a ceasefire.
In his own address to the UN on Thursday, the Prime Minister said: “I call on Israel and Hezbollah. Stop the violence. Step back from the brink. “We need to see an immediate ceasefire to provide space for a diplomatic settlement and we are working with all partners to that end.”
The PA news agency understands the UK Government has successfully asked airlines to increase capacity on routes out of Lebanon, with Foreign Office teams in Beirut to support British consulate services. It is thought they are ready to facilitate evacuations by sea or air, which could be triggered if the security environment degrades further and British nationals are no longer able to leave the Middle East through other routes. Around 5,000 British citizens are in Lebanon, and the United Nations said 118,000 Lebanese people have been displaced in recent days.

U.S. airstrikes on Syria kill 37 militants affiliated with extremist groups
Associated Press/BEIRUT (AP)/Sun, September 29, 2024
In Syria, 37 militants affiliated to the extremist Islamic State group and an al-Qaeda-linked group were killed in two strikes, the United States military said Sunday. Two of the dead were senior militants, it said. U.S. Central Command said it struck northwestern Syria on Tuesday, targeting a senior militant from the al-Qaeda-linked Hurras al-Deen group and eight others. They say he was responsible for overseeing military operations. They also announced a strike from earlier this month on Sept. 16, where they conducted a “large-scale airstrike” on an IS training camp in a remote undisclosed location in central Syria. That attack killed 28 militants, including “at least four Syrian leaders.”“The airstrike will disrupt ISIS’ capability to conduct operations against U.S. interests, as well as our allies and partners,” the statement read. There are some 900 U.S. forces in Syria, along with an undisclosed number of contractors, mostly trying to prevent any comeback by the extremist IS group, which swept through Iraq and Syria in 2014, taking control of large swaths of territory.
U.S. forces advise and assist their key allies in northeastern Syria, the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, located not far from strategic areas where Iran-backed militant groups are present, including a key border crossing with Iraq.

Trump escalates attacks on Harris' mental fitness and suggests she should be prosecuted
Adriana Gomez Licon And Colleen Long/ERIE, Pa. (AP)/September 29, 2024
Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump escalated his personal attacks on his Democratic rival, Kamala Harris, on Sunday by repeating an insult that she was “mentally impaired” while also saying she should be “impeached and prosecuted." Trump's rally in Erie, Pennsylvania, took on similar themes as an event one day earlier that he himself described as a “dark speech.” He told a cheering crowd Sunday that Harris was responsible for an “invasion” at the U.S.-Mexico border and "she should be impeached and prosecuted for her actions.” “Crooked Joe Biden became mentally impaired,” he added. “Sad. But lying Kamala Harris, honestly, I believe she was born that way. There’s something wrong with Kamala. And I just don’t know what it is, but there is definitely something missing. And you know what, everybody knows it.”
With just over a month until the election, Trump is intensifying his use of personal and offensive attacks, even as some Republicans say he'd be better off sticking to the issues.
His suggestions that political enemies be prosecuted are particularly notable for their departure from norms in the U.S. in which the justice system is supposed to be protected from political influence. In recent weeks, Trump has threatened prosecutions of Google for allegedly giving priority to “good stories” about Harris and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Trump has long threatened legal action against his rivals, including President Joe Biden and his 2016 rival, Hillary Clinton. This month he vowed to jail those “involved in unscrupulous behavior” this election, including election workers, lawyers, political operatives, donors, and voters, yet again attempting to sow doubt about the integrity of the election.
But he also has many legal problems of his own. He was convicted in May of falsifying business records in a hush money case in New York, with a sentencing scheduled for Nov. 26. Two other cases are pending — a federal case for his alleged role in the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection, and a state case in Georgia for his efforts to overturn his 2020 loss there to Biden. Prosecutors are appealing a federal judge's dismissal of a case involving his handling of classified documents.
Trump argues federal and state prosecutors are targeting him for political reasons, though there is no evidence to suggest that is true. If he wins the election, Trump could potentially pardon himself on the federal cases or order the Justice Department to shut down their investigations of him.
On Sunday, he acknowledged he might lose in November: “If she wins, it's not going to be so pleasant for me, but I don't care.”Trump has derided Harris, the first Black woman and person of South Asian descent to lead a major party ticket, as “stupid,” “weak,” “dumb as a rock” and “lazy.” His allies have pushed him publicly and privately to talk instead about the economy, immigration and other issues. “I just think the better course to take is to prosecute the case that her policies are destroying the country,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., on CNN's “State of the Union" Sunday when asked about Trump's comments. “They’re crazy liberal.”
When asked whether he approved of the personal attacks on Harris, Rep. Tom Emmer, R-Minn., sidestepped during an interview on ABC’s “This Week.”“I think Kamala Harris is the wrong choice for America,” said Emmer, who is helping Trump’s running mate JD Vance prepare for Tuesday’s vice-presidential debate. “I think Kamala Harris is actually as bad or worse as the administration that we’ve witnessed for the last four years.”When pressed, Emmer said: “I think we should stick to the issues. The issues are, Donald Trump fixed it once. They broke it. He’s going to fix it again. Those are the issues.”Former Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, running for the Senate as a moderate Republican, brought up Trump's false claims that Harris, the daughter of Jamaican and Indian immigrants, had previously played down her Black heritage. Harris attended Howard University, a historically Black institution, and has identified as both Black and South Asian consistently throughout her political career. “I’ve already called him out when he had the one interview where he was questioning her racial identity, and now he’s questioning her mental competence," Hogan told CBS' “Face the Nation.” “And I think that’s insulting not only to the vice president but to people who actually do have mental disabilities.” Harris has not commented on Trump’s recent attacks but has said when asked about other comments that it was the “ same old show. The same tired playbook we’ve heard for years with no plan on on how he would address the needs of the American people.”Ahead of the rally on Sunday, some of Trump's supporters said he often makes offensive remarks. Still, they support his proposals to restrict immigration and said he would have a better handle on the economy. “He says what’s on his mind, and again, sometimes how he says it isn’t appropriate,” said Jeffrey Balogh, 56, who attended the rally with two friends. “But he did the job. He did very well at it.”Tamara Molnar said she thinks Trump is very strong on immigration. As for his insults, Molnar said: “I think everybody has to have some decorum when speaking about other candidates, and I don’t think either side is necessarily innocent on that. There’s a lot of slinging both ways.”
At the rally in Erie, Trump said the “invasion” would end and deportations would begin if he took office. “Thousands of migrants from the most dangerous countries are destroying the character of small towns and leaving local communities in anguish and in despair,” he said, talking about communities in the battleground states of Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. Last month, the GOP leader said he was “entitled” to personal attacks against Harris. “As far as the personal attacks, I’m very angry at her because of what she’s done to the country," he told a news conference then. “I’m very angry at her that she would weaponize the justice system against me and other people, very angry at her. I think I’m entitled to personal attacks.”

French FM in Beirut, despite air strikes: ministry
AFP/September 30, 2024
BEIRUT, Lebanon: French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot arrived in Lebanon on Sunday night, his ministry said, making him the first high-level foreign diplomat to visit since Israeli air strikes intensified one week ago. The arrival of Barrot, who earlier called for an immediate halt to the strikes, came as the foreign ministry announced that a second French national had been killed in Lebanon, though details were unclear. Barrot oversaw delivery of 11.5 tonnes of French humanitarian aid, Lebanon's Health Minister Firass Abiad said. After a meeting about the status of French nationals, Barrot on Monday will meet officials including Prime Minister Najib Mikati. He is also due to meet the UN Special Coordinator for Lebanon and members of the UN peacekeeping force in the south. "We confirm the death of a second French national," his ministry said Sunday, adding that further details will be supplied later. The death comes after an 87-year-old French woman died last Monday after a blast in a village in south Lebanon. Israel's military on Sunday said it struck more targets of Lebanon's Iran-backed group Hezbollah, after its leader Hassan Nasrallah was killed in a Beirut air raid on Friday. The violence has raised strong fears of even further escalation in the Middle East. French President Emmanuel Macron has also appointed a former foreign and defence minister, Jean-Yves Le Drian, as special envoy to Lebanon. Le Drian has visited the country six times, most recently at the beginning of the week.

Frankly Speaking: Is a new civil war inevitable in Lebanon?
ARAB NEWS/September 29, 2024
DUBAI: Hassan Nasrallah, the longstanding Hezbollah leader who was killed in an Israeli strike on his Beirut stronghold over the weekend, was the author of deep divisions in Lebanon, which have long threatened to drag the nation back into the mire of civil war.
Since the latest hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah suddenly escalated in mid-September, reports have circulated on social media about flare-ups in sectarian tensions in different parts of Lebanon as a result of mass displacement of people from the south.
Appearing on the Arab News current affairs program “Frankly Speaking,” Firass Abiad, Lebanon’s minister of public health, insisted the conflict had not created a sectarian split in society, as even many Shiites, who form Hezbollah’s support base, now appear to oppose the militia’s actions. “There’s clearly a lot of people in Lebanon who oppose the politics and what Hezbollah is doing. There’s no denying that, if you talk to people,” Abiad told “Frankly Speaking” host Katie Jensen.
“This is across the board. This is not sectarian, (it’s) among all sects, including Shittes, you have people who oppose Hezbollah.”
Dr. Firass Abiad, Lebanon’s minister of public health, insisted the conflict had not created a sectarian split in society, even as many Shiites, who form Hezbollah’s support base, appear to oppose the militia’s actions. (AN photo)
At the same time, however, Abiad said Israel’s strikes on Lebanon had created a spirit of solidarity across Lebanon’s multiconfessional society, similar to the sympathy generated across the Arab world for the Palestinians — even among those who oppose Hamas — in the wake of Israel’s assault on Gaza. “What Israel is doing by these indiscriminate attacks, when they attack a Christian or even when they are attacking Shiite areas … this will only increase the feeling of solidarity with the community where Hezbollah is based,” he said.
“We’ve seen this also with Gaza. If you look at the Arab world, the support for Hamas is not high. But when people see the atrocities, the carnage that Israel is perpetrating in Gaza, I think that, unanimously, a lot of people have a lot of sympathy with the people of Palestine.
“And Israel, in the way it is conducting its war on Lebanon, has fostered this environment of solidarity.”Abiad said this sense of solidarity was evident on Sept. 16 and 17, when Hezbollah communication devices, including pagers and walkie-talkies, exploded simultaneously in a coordinated attack blamed on Israel that killed at least 32 and injured more than 3,000.
“You could see this on the day of the attack on the explosive devices,” said Abiad. “We at the Ministry of Health were sending patients all across the country because we had to have a full response from all hospitals.
“And even when we were sending patients into hospitals that were in areas that are politically, or from a religious perspective, diametrically opposite to Hezbollah, the people who were injured were welcomed, they were cared for, they were given attention.
“This is something that Israel has repeatedly failed to understand; that its indiscriminate targeting or its dehumanization of all, for example, Arabs, or communities, would only lead to more sympathy with the ‘said’ enemies.”
On Saturday, Hezbollah confirmed Nasrallah had been killed in an Israeli strike on the group’s Dahiyeh stronghold in Beirut. The attack follows days of Israeli strikes across Lebanon, which, as of Saturday, had left 1,030 people — including 156 women and 87 children — dead.
Hezbollah began rocketing northern Israel last October in solidarity with the Palestinian militant group Hamas, whose Oct. 7 assault on southern Israel triggered the war in Gaza. Israel retaliated by mounting strikes on Hezbollah targets.
Since mid-September, Israeli strikes on Hezbollah targets across the country have rapidly escalated. However, the roots of the conflict run deeper than last October. The two sides have been locked in an intermittent confrontation since the Lebanese civil war.
Hezbollah was formed during Israel’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon. Major escalations occurred in 1993, 1996, and particularly in 2006, when a full-scale war erupted, causing significant destruction in Lebanon.
Hezbollah has since strengthened its military capabilities, while maintaining its role in Lebanese politics. Tensions continued, with periodic border clashes, as the group has evolved into a key player in the broader Israel-Iran proxy conflict.
Israel withdrew its troops from Lebanon in 2000, creating the possibility of stability for Lebanon. However, territorial disputes remained, which Hezbollah exploited to build support and to justify continued resistance to Israel.
Does a share of the blame for the continuation of hostilities, therefore, belong to Hezbollah?
“No, that’s the exact opposite,” said Abiad. “If you go back to the UN resolutions — especially 1701. In 1701, it was very clear that, first of all, Israel has to withdraw from all the areas in Lebanon, which did not happen. And up till now, Israel still occupies Lebanese territory.”
UN Security Council Resolution 1701, adopted in 2006, called for a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah, ending the Lebanon War. It demanded the disarmament of Hezbollah, the withdrawal of Israeli forces from southern Lebanon, and the deployment of Lebanese and UN peacekeeping troops to stabilize the region and prevent future conflict.
“Secondly, it very clearly mentioned that Israel should not violate Lebanese airspace, which also did not happen; Israel has been violating Lebanese airspace continuously since the 2000 partial withdrawal from Lebanon,” said Abiad.
“So, indeed, unfortunately, these actions by Israel gave the pretext for Hezbollah to continue today what it is doing now. But let’s be very clear, Israel didn’t fulfill that part of 1701. And even now, Lebanon is saying we are ready to abide by the UN Security Council resolutions.”
One particularly irksome issue relates to the Shebaa Farms — a dispute that centers on a small strip of land claimed by Lebanon but occupied by Israel since 1967.
While Israel and the UN consider it part of Syria’s Golan Heights, Lebanon argues the area is Lebanese, fueling tensions, especially involving Hezbollah, over its sovereignty.
Given what is now occurring in Lebanon, does Abiad believe continuing the Shebaa Farms dispute with Israel has been worthwhile? Surely a negotiated deal would have been a far better option?
“But that depends on the other party accepting a negotiation,” said Abiad. “And, up to now, it has been very clear that Israel is not interested in a negotiated outcome.”
Whoever is ultimately to blame for prolonging the conflict, the result today is mass displacement, civilians killed, thousands injured, and public health system under extreme strain.
The ongoing conflict has created a massive humanitarian crisis, with widespread displacement across the country. According to the Lebanese government’s estimates, nearly 500,000 people have been forced to flee their homes due to escalating violence.
Abiad highlighted the magnitude of the displacement from the south. “Before the attacks, the number released by the disaster management side was 130,000 displaced,” he said.
“Remember that by that time, there was an escalation of hostilities by Israel, and the populations were internally displaced still into southern areas.”
Abiad said the Lebanese government has established 400 public shelters, which currently house about 70,000 people. However, he said the total number of displaced people is far higher.
“We estimate that usually, from our past experience in the 2006 war, the number of people, whether they are living with friends, family, in homes they rented, or even across the border into neighboring countries, is four to five times as many as there are in shelters,” he said.
“And that’s why we really believe that the tally of people who have been displaced is probably around 400,000 to 500,000.”
The pressure on hospitals, in particular, is reaching breaking point.
“The daily tally of casualties keeps rising, as hospitals get overwhelmed with casualties,” said Abiad. “Can we continue all this? The answer is we are working at nearly full capacity, I would say. And it is becoming more tough as the war drags on.”
He added: “I think the most challenging would be fuel. I think that, concerning nurses, hospital beds, medical supplies, medications, as I said, we have been stocking up on our inventory. But really, fuel is going to be a critical issue.
“Hospitals, ambulances, they all require fuel to function. Now we have been increasing the renewable-energy budgets in our hospitals — 15 of our public hospitals now have renewable energy, constituting almost 40 percent of their energy requirements.
“Almost 200 of our primary health care centers now completely can work or function on renewable energy. But clearly I would say fuel is going to be critical if there is a further escalation.”
On top of this, Abiad accused Israel of deliberately targeting medical personnel — something he says constitutes a war crime. “Do we consider this a war crime? Of course, we consider this a war crime,” said Abiad, adding that this was not just the view of the Lebanese government but echoed by international legal bodies. “When we listen to the International Court of Justice, these are the experts on what is international humanitarian law and whether it has been violated. So these are the experts telling us that what Israel is doing constitutes war crimes.”

Iran mourns Nasrallah with ‘strategic patience’ and empty rhetoric
BARIA ALAMUDDIN/Arab News/September 30, 2024
There is nothing to celebrate in the killing of Hassan Nasrallah, nor that of nearly 1,000 Lebanese citizens in two weeks of Israeli violence. Even among many who loathed everything Nasrallah stood for, there has been widespread sadness and disorientation at the sudden disappearance of a charismatic figure who played a pivotal role in national and regional politics for decades.
I have long been a critic of Hezbollah’s foremost allegiance being to Ayatollah Khamenei and Iran, at huge cost to Lebanon’s national interest. Nasrallah’s bold resistance to Israel’s occupation of Palestinian land, exemplified by the 2006 war, made him an iconic, Che Guevara-like figure — until Hezbollah utterly disgraced itself fighting on behalf of the Assad regime in Syria, and repeatedly showed itself to be the plaything of Tehran.
There is all-pervading trepidation at what comes next: an escalation in violence, a ground invasion of Lebanon by Israel, or other Iranian proxies entering the fray. Iran’s first reaction was to rush Khamenei to a safe location, highlighting the regime’s fears that it sits directly in the line of fire. After the 2006 war a chastened Nasrallah admitted that he would never have dragged Lebanon into that conflict if he had known what Israel’s bloodthirsty response would be: he did not live long enough to admit making the same mistake twice.
Israel’s decapitation of Hezbollah represents the death of the myth of Iran’s “Axis of Resistance,” which had been supposed to be a deterrent to Israel, protecting southern Lebanon, and a vanguard for liberating Jerusalem and eradicating Israel.
Recent developments demonstrate the vacuous futility of such rhetoric: Hezbollah did nothing to halt the mass killing in Gaza, responding with empty threats as Israel decimated the leadership of both Hamas and Hezbollah. Israel simultaneously knocked out Hezbollah’s pager communications network and put hundreds of the organization’s operatives in hospital. Then, with almost casual brutality, it took out Nasrallah himself, along with entire blocks of residential housing.
Hezbollah didn’t protect Lebanon, it placed the country in the line of fire. Paramilitaries in Syria, Iraq and Yemen played a similarly destabilizing role, making attacks by Israel and its allies far more likely. After Nasrallah’s death, Iranians complained that not only had these Arab proxies drained billions from the state purse, but they also risked dragging Iran directly into a regionalized conflict in which they had no stake.
Last week I was in New York, where, as Israel was striking Beirut, Iranian leaders such as President Masoud Pezeshkian were sipping tea at the UN General Assembly, discussing improved ties and renewed nuclear talks — deludedly out of touch with events.
This has all fatally undermined Tehran’s regional credibility. The Axis of Resistance proved to be a paper tiger, while the ayatollahs passively abandoned Hezbollah and Hamas to their fates. Many of us previously mocked these Tehran-worshipping proxies, observing that “Daddy” Khamenei would never come and rescue them if they faced annihilation. After last week, has Hezbollah finally comprehended this lesson?
Israel’s decapitation of Hezbollah represents the death of the myth of Iran’s “Axis of Resistance,” which had been supposed to be a deterrent to Israel, protecting southern Lebanon, and a vanguard for liberating Jerusalem and eradicating Israel.
Khamenei and his generals threatened to make Israel regret Nasrallah’s killing, and said his death was a harbinger of Israel’s destruction. But when asked why Iran had failed to avenge the 2020 death of Qassem Soleimani, and countless other Revlutionary Guard and Hezbollah commanders, the regime waffled on about “strategic patience” and awaiting the appropriate moment. Nasrallah now has eternity in which to await Tehran getting around to avenging him.
Nasrallah was a relative pragmatist who in recent months had fatefully sought to exert pressure on Israel, without provoking full-blown conflict. By eliminating Nasrallah and Hezbollah’s veteran leadership, Israel risks the organization falling into the hands of hot-headed hawkish subordinates whose first priority may be vengeance. Nasrallah was a godfather figure to vast armies of transnational paramilitaries, which Hezbollah trained and mobilized, who will also be anxious to exact a bloody price for Nasrallah’s death. But after their feared rocket arsenals proved puny and impotent in the face of Israel’s superior firepower, will Iran now choose to restrain them, lest at a stroke it loses all its regional cards?
All Iran’s current options are bad options: arousing the wrath of Israel and America by lashing out, or risking ridicule and irrelevance by failing to follow through on fire-breathing rhetoric. The danger is that Tehran learns the wrong lessons from these setbacks: despatching copious new funding and weapons to shore up its proxies, while rushing forward to acquire a nuclear deterrent. The West must vigorously act to prevent this eventuality.
Just as Soleimani’s death weakened Iran’s ability to control its regional proxies, the killing of Nasrallah and his commanders weakens Hezbollah’s ability to politically dominate Lebanon. There is a slender window of opportunity here for the Lebanese government to stave off conflict and radically cut Hezbollah’s all-pervading influence down to size, while slamming the door on Iranian hegemony. Hezbollah will appoint new leaders, but they’ll never enjoy a fragment of Nasrallah’s prestige and clout.
Similarly, in Iraq, Syria and Yemen, Iran-backed mafioso militias have permanently lost their aura of invincibility and legitimacy, while Iran’s regional dominance has been shown to be a cowardly mirage that disperses at the first sign of confrontation.
The supposedly almighty Axis of Resistance has for years been wielded as a blunt weapon with which to menace the region, yet at the first sign of trouble it behaved like a balloon pricked by a pin. Before these vengeful paramilitaries embark on further efforts to engulf the region in conflict, let’s sweep them aside and for the first time in decades see the Arab world take its destiny in its own hands.
• Baria Alamuddin is an award-winning journalist and broadcaster in the Middle East and the UK. She is editor of the Media Services Syndicate and has interviewed numerous heads of state.

Aside from Israel, Lebanon needs to be protected from another enemy: itself
FAISAL J. ABBAS/Arab News/September 29, 2024
The assassination of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah will undoubtedly be a game-changer, not just for Lebanon, but for the whole region as well.
Will this be the end of the Iran-backed Hezbollah and its tight grip on Lebanon, which has lasted for decades? Time will tell. However, given the fact that Israel has also assassinated a large number of Hezbollah’s top-ranking generals and division leaders means that, even if the group were to live on, it would most likely be a caricature of its former self.
This is especially true when we take recent events into consideration. The carefully planned attacks that took place before Nasrallah’s assassination — such as when pagers and walkie-talkies exploded in the hands of 3,000 Hezbollah commanders and soldiers this month and the series of targeted assassinations that took out the likes of Fouad Shukr — clearly indicate that Israel has superior intelligence capabilities or that Hezbollah has been infiltrated, or most probably both.
This makes it unlikely that Hezbollah is capable of responding meaningfully or painfully as Israel will likely know about any attack in advance. (The fact that the most gruesome attack Hezbollah has successfully carried out this year destroyed only a chicken coop in northern Israel in July might support this argument.)The other alternative is that this will mean an all-out war of revenge backed by the party’s biggest supporter, the Iranian regime. However, the most recent events show no evidence that this will be the case. In New York last week, the Iranian president hinted that he was willing to talk with the US, while the leadership in Tehran is yet to avenge the killing of more senior officials that are closer to its heart, such as Maj. Gen. Mohammed Reza Zahedi, the Quds Force’s top commander in Syria and Lebanon, who was killed in the attack on Iran’s consulate in Damascus in April, and even the 2020 assassination of General Qassem Soleimani. Meanwhile, the statement of Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei that all Muslims should “stand by the people of Lebanon and the proud Hezbollah with whatever means they have and assist them in confronting the … wicked regime (of Israel)” could either be perceived as mere lip service or could actually trigger a retaliation.
In a country already plagued by sectarianism, lawlessness, and plenty of guns, such a contrast between glee and grief is a recipe for disaster.
What is tragic for both normal Palestinians and Lebanese, who have nothing to do with either Hamas or Hezbollah, is that such rhetoric only strengthens Israel, no matter what happens.
If Iran, and its militias, fail to respond, it means Israel also wins psychologically yet again. If Hezbollah retaliates as a group, or if any of its followers worldwide acts individually, this would distract global public opinion from the mounting accusations of war crimes committed in Gaza and Lebanon, and allow the Israeli government to repeat, yet again, that it is only defending itself. In parallel, the biggest threat to Lebanon is not only the indiscriminate bombing of civilians and infrastructure by Israel, but the potential outbreak of a new civil war.
Given that the country has a leadership vacuum, a weak army, and an outburst of contrasting emotions — given the divisive nature of the late Hezbollah leader — another civil war is not an unlikely scenario.
We need to remember that to his avid followers, the late Nasrallah was considered a hero and even a saint. To his opponents, he was a traitor who served the interests of Iran, not Lebanon. In a country already plagued by sectarianism, lawlessness, and plenty of guns, such a contrast between glee and grief is a recipe for disaster. Indeed, Nasrallah was both the resistance leader and liberator of the south on one hand; and an enemy of the state on another. Many in Lebanon, and beyond, will never forgive him for turning the nation into a failed state, for being the architect of the 2005 assassination of reformist former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, and for taking over Beirut by force in 2008. Meanwhile, many Arab nations still have limited relations with Lebanon because Nasrallah oversaw the export of drugs, weapons, fighters, and radical ideology to them.
This is why, apart from Israel, Lebanon needs to be protected from itself as well at this stage. It desperately needs unity and a patriotic, strong and wise government now more than ever. Its sectarian leaders must act immediately to rein in their followers, the international community needs to impose a ceasefire as soon as possible, and foreign humanitarian aid and assistance to the wounded and displaced needs to start pouring in to prevent the situation from deteriorating any further. As for Israel, it needs also to remember that only a two-state solution will guarantee its safety. The more innocent men, women and children it kills in Gaza and Lebanon, the more it is contributing to Hamas and Hezbollah 2.0.
**Faisal J. Abbas is the Editor-in-Chief of Arab News. X: @FaisalJAbbas

The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on September 29-30/2024
Netanyahu at UNGA: ‘No place in Iran the long arm of Israel cannot reach’
Mike Wagenheim/Israel Today/September 29/2024
Israel’s prime minister chastises the United Nations, saying “enough is enough” of Hezbollah’s attacks on northern border cities and villages. A defiant Benjamin Netanyahu told the U.N. General Assembly on Friday morning that he had a message for “the tyrants of Tehan: If you strike us, we will strike you,” adding that “there is no place in Iran that the long arm of Israel cannot reach, and that is true of the entire Middle East.”Israel has been the target of heavy criticism throughout the week at the annual gathering of world leaders, purportedly due to its prosecution of the war against Hamas.
However, the Israeli prime minister, pointing to his maiden address as Israel’s U.N. ambassador some 40 years ago in which he defended Israel against a proposal to expel it from the organization, said on Friday that “there is nothing new at the United Nations.”
He accused the world body, which he referred to as an “anti-Israel Flat Earth Society,” along with member states, of attempting to strip Israel of its ability to defend itself. “If you can’t defend yourself,” he stated plainly, referring to the Middle East, “you can’t exist—not in our neighborhood.”Ultimately, Netanyahu said the global diplomatic assault against Israel since Oct. 7 is “not about Gaza. It’s about Israel. It’s always been about Israel—Israel’s very existence.”Dozens of diplomats left the General Assembly Hall as Netanyahu took to the podium. The Palestinians, Iranians and Saudis were among those who left their seats empty. Netanyahu lamented on Friday how close Israel and Saudi Arabia were to normalization prior to the massacre by Hamas terrorists on Oct. 7. Much of Netanyahu’s 2023 speech to the General Assembly reflected the hope at that time that an agreement was within reach.
“This is an opportunity that we and the world should not let go by,” he said about the potential of further normalization with the Arab and Muslim world.
‘The Blessing and The Curse’
During his talk, he displayed two maps titled “The Blessing” and “The Curse,” respectively. “The Blessing,” he said, represented a land bridge connecting the Middle East with Asia and Europe that would carry railways, energy pipelines and fiber optics—all possible through peace agreements that were close to being finalized before the events on Oct. 7. Meanwhile, “The Curse” showed Iran’s footprint in the region. “If you think this map is only a curse for Israel, you should think again,” said Netanyahu, adding that Iran’s aggression, unchecked, would have global implications since the Islamic Republic already funding terror networks on five continents. He insisted that “we are winning” the six-front war organized by Iran while focusing on “mopping up” Hamas’s remaining capabilities in the Gaza Strip and on “our sacred mission, bringing the hostages home.”He said he is in favor of a local administration in Gaza “committed to peaceful coexistence” taking over once Hamas’s rule is finished, though he did not specifically say he welcomed or barred the Palestinian Authority from playing a role. His message to the captors of the remaining hostages—dead and alive—was brief. “Let them go,” he exclaimed, as he acknowledged the families of several hostages who had traveled with him to New York, relaying some of their stories to those in attendance.
Taking apart the terror chain of command
Left unanswered is the question of whether Netanyahu will accept the American and French-led effort to achieve a three-week ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah, which Netanyahu dubbed on Friday the “quintessential terror organization in the world,” which has “killed more Americans and Frenchmen than any group other than [Osama] bin Laden.”After initially spurring the Biden-Macron proposal upon landing in New York on Thursday—a proposal that Washington apparently believed Netanyahu had accepted—the Israeli prime minister toned down his language on Friday, stating that he “shares the aim” of the proposal though stopped short of endorsing it. Netanyahu told the General Assembly that Israel was taking apart Hezbollah’s chain of command, including their “replacements and the replacements of replacements.”He asked rhetorically what the American government would do if El Paso and San Diego became ghost towns, as much of Israel’s north has become, due to the kind of incessant rocket and missile fire that Israel has endured from Hezbollah for nearly a year.“How long would the American government tolerate it? I doubt it would do so for a single day,” said Netanyahu, adding that “enough is enough.”

Biden: Nasrallah’s death ‘a measure of justice’ for his victims
JNS/Israel Today Staff /September 29, 2024
“The United States fully supports Israel’s right to defend itself against Hezbollah, Hamas, the Houthis, and any other Iranian-supported terrorist groups,” said the American president. U.S President Joe Biden on Saturday praised Israel’s targeted killing of Hezbollah terror master Hassan Nasrallah in Beirut, saying the development had brought justice to his thousands of victims. “Hassan Nasrallah and the terrorist group he led, Hezbollah, were responsible for killing hundreds of Americans over a four-decade reign of terror. His death from an Israeli airstrike is a measure of justice for his many victims, including thousands of Americans, Israelis, and Lebanese civilians,” he said. “The strike that killed Nasrallah took place in the broader context of the conflict that began with Hamas’s massacre on October 7, 2023. Nasrallah, the next day, made the fateful decision to join hands with Hamas and open what he called a ‘northern front’ against Israel,” the statement continued. Nasrallah was killed on Friday in an Israel Defense Forces strike on Hezbollah’s underground headquarters in the heart of Beirut’s Dahiyeh district.
The strike was called “Operation New Order” by the IDF. “The United States fully supports Israel’s right to defend itself against Hezbollah, Hamas, the Houthis, and any other Iranian-supported terrorist groups,” said Biden on Saturday. “Just yesterday, I directed my secretary of defense to further enhance the defense posture of U.S. military forces in the Middle East region to deter aggression and reduce the risk of a broader regional war,” the statement continued. Washington’s ultimate aim “is to de-escalate the ongoing conflicts in both Gaza and Lebanon through diplomatic means,” said Biden. “In Gaza, we have been pursuing a deal backed by the U.N. Security Council for a ceasefire and the release of hostages. In Lebanon, we have been negotiating a deal that would return people safely to their homes in Israel and Southern Lebanon. It is time for these deals to close, for the threats to Israel to be removed, and for the broader Middle East region to gain greater stability.” Speaker of the House of Representatives Mike Johnson (R-La.) also released a statement on Saturday praising Nasrallah’s assassination, calling on the Biden-Harris administration to end its effort for broker a ceasefire and double down on Washington’s support for the Jewish state. “Hassan Nasrallah’s reign of bloodshed, oppression, and terror has been brought to an end. A puppet of the Iranian regime, he was one of the most brutal terrorists on the planet, and a coward who hid behind women and children to carry out his attacks,” read the statement, co-authored with House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.) and Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.).
“Thanks to the brave men and women of the Israeli military, justice was delivered for Israeli victims of his heinous crimes, their families, and the United States. The world is better off without him,” the statement continued. The top Republican lawmakers then shifted their attention to the White House, calling on it “to end its counter-productive calls for a ceasefire and its ongoing diplomatic pressure campaign against Israel.” Nasrallah’s death was “a major step forward for the Middle East, and today’s victory for peace and security should be used to reassert America’s ironclad support for Israel as it fights for its very right to exist,” the statement continued. On Wednesday, the United States, Australia, Canada, European Union, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and Qatar called jointly for an “immediate 21-day ceasefire across the Lebanon-Israel border to provide space for diplomacy towards the conclusion of a diplomatic settlement.”Before the statement went out, Biden and French President Emmanuel Macron stated that “it is time for a settlement on the Israel-Lebanon border that ensures safety and security to enable civilians to return to their homes.”
Neither statement mentioned Hezbollah. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday that he “shares the aim” of the U.S.-led diplomatic push to end the intensifying war with Hezbollah, speaking hours after insisting that the IDF would not back down amid reports of an imminent ceasefire.

Israeli airstrikes kill 11 Palestinians in Gaza
Nidal al-Mughrabi/CAIRO (Reuters)/September 29, 2024
Israeli military strikes across the Gaza Strip have killed at least 11 Palestinians, health officials in the enclave said on Sunday, as Israeli planes bombarded several northern, central and southern areas. A school sheltering displaced Palestinians in Beit Lahiya in the northern Gaza Strip was among buildings hit, killing four people and wounded several others, Gaza medics said. The Israeli military said it struck Hamas militants operating from a command centre embedded in a compound that had previously served as Um Al-Fahm School. It accused Hamas of exploiting civilian facilities and its population for military purposes, which Hamas denies. In another strike, three people were killed in a house in Gaza City, medics said. Four others were killed in three separate airstrikes in Nuseirat and Khan Younis in central and southern parts of the Gaza Strip. Israeli forces pursued their operations in Rafah, near the border with Egypt, and in Gaza City's suburb of Zeitoun, where forces blew up several houses, according to residents and Hamas media. On Sunday the Israeli military said forces continue the fight in a "multi-front war" and are operating in Gaza to bring Israeli and foreign hostages home and to "dismantle" Hamas.
It said troops discovered and dismantled an underground tunnel route that is approximately 1km long near residential buildings and civilian spaces in central Gaza, adding that they found several rooms and equipment used by Hamas for proonged periods. Fighting and Israeli military activities in Gaza have declined in the past week as Israel escalated its military offensive against Iranian-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon, killing its leader Hassan Nasrallah in an airstrike on Friday. The group announced Nasrallah's death on Saturday. Most of Gaza's population of 2.3 million have been displaced by the war, in which 41,500 Palestinians have been killed, according to Gaza health authorities. Israel and Hamas have been fighting since gunmen from the Palestinian militant group stormed into southern Israel on Oct. 7, killing 1,200 people and capturing about 250 hostages, going by Israeli tallies.
(Reporting by Nidal al-Mughrabi; Editing by David Goodman)

Israel Strikes Houthi Targets in Yemen, Killing at Least Four People
Reuters/September 29, 2024
Israel said it bombed Houthi targets in Yemen on Sunday in response to missile fire by the Iran-aligned militants at Israel over the past two days, marking another front in fighting in the Middle East. The Israeli strikes killed at least four people and wounded 29, the Houthi-run Health Ministry said in a statement, and residents said the bombing had caused power outages in most parts of the port city of Hodeidah. Israel's military said in a statement that dozens of aircraft, including fighter jets, had attacked power plants and a sea port in Hodeidah and the port of Ras Issa. It was the second such Israeli attack on Yemen in just over two months. In July, Israeli warplanes struck Houthi military targets near Hodeidah after a Yemeni drone hit Tel Aviv and killed one man. "Over the past year, the Houthis have been operating under the direction and funding of Iran, and in cooperation with Iraqi militias in order to attack the State of Israel, undermine regional stability, and disrupt global freedom of navigation," the military statement said. Yemen's Houthi militants, backed by Iran, have repeatedly fired missiles and drones at Israel in what they say is solidarity with Palestinians, since the Gaza war began with a Hamas attack on Israel on Oct. 7. In their latest attack, the Houthis said they had launched a ballistic missile on Saturday towards the Ben Gurion International Airport near Tel Aviv, which Israel said it had intercepted. Israel intercepted another Houthi missile on Friday. In a post on X, Mohammed Abdulsalam, a spokesperson for the Houthis, said Sunday's Israeli strikes would not cause the group to "abandon Gaza and Lebanon". Iran condemned the Israeli strikes, saying they had targeted civilian infrastructure, and President Masoud Pezeshkian said Israel should not be allowed to attack countries in the Iran-aligned "Axis of Resistance" one after the other.
The Houthi movement earlier mourned Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah, its ally in an Iran-backed alliance opposing Israel, following his death in an Israeli airstrike in Beirut.

Israel Bombs Yemen Port, Power Stations After Houthi Attacks
Mohammed Hatem and Marissa Newman/Bloomberg/September 29, 2024
Israeli fighter jets bombed a seaport and several power stations in Yemen, its military said Sunday, following a string of attacks this month on central Israel by Iran-backed Houthi rebels. The strikes in the Red Sea port city of Hodeidah and in Ras Issa targeted oil infrastructure, the Israeli army said in a statement. Al-Masirah TV, which is controlled by the Houthis, said four people were killed and 33 were injured. Residents said the Israeli strikes hit fuel storage tanks at the Hodeidah port, and smoke was seen billowing from the site. The Yemen-based Houthis claimed responsibility for two missile attacks on the Tel Aviv area on Friday and Saturday. The missiles were intercepted by Israel’s air defenses. During Saturday’s attack, the Houthis fired a long-range missile at Israel, saying they were targeting Ben Gurion Airport as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu returned from the United Nations General Assembly. Sirens went off at the airport, but Israeli air defense shot the missile down over the Jerusalem area. Israel previously hit Hodeidah after a Houthi-launched drone hit a building in Tel Aviv on July 19, killing a man and injuring several other people. “The IDF is determined to continue operating at any distance — near or far — against all threats to the citizens of the State of Israel,” the Israel Defense Forces said. The strikes involved dozens of Israeli aircraft that traveled more than 1,800 kilometers (about 1,100 miles). Israel’s strike to the south coincided with its campaign of air strikes to the north in Lebanon that have killed most leaders of Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed militia headquartered in Beirut. More than 1,000 people have been killed in Lebanon and hundreds of thousands displaced by the bombardments.

Iran's president denounces Israeli attacks on Tehran's regional allies
Reuters/September 29, 2024
DUBAI (Reuters) - Israel should not be allowed to attack countries in the Iran-aligned "Axis of Resistance" one after the other, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said on Sunday. Israel said it had bombed Houthi targets in Yemen on Sunday, expanding its confrontation with Iran's allies in the region after killing the Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah on Friday in an escalating conflict in Lebanon. Pezeshkian, in comments carried by state media, said Lebanon should be supported. "Lebanese fighters should not be left alone in this battle so that the Zionist regime (Israel) does not attack Axis of Resistance countries one after the other," he said. An Iranian Revolutionary Guards deputy commander, Abbas Nilforoushan, was also killed in the attack that killed the Hezbollah leader in Beirut. "We cannot accept such actions and they will not be left unanswered. A decisive reaction is necessary," Pezeshkian said.
Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanaani condemned the Israeli strikes in Yemen, saying in a statement that they had targeted "civilian infrastructure" such as a power plant and fuel tanks. "Iran once again warns about the consequences of the Zionist regime's (Israel) warmongering on regional and international peace and security," spokesperson Nasser Kanaani added. In another Israeli attack on Yemen in July, fighter jets bombed "dual-use sites such as energy infrastructure" in Hodeidah, with Israel's military spokesperson saying the port was used by the Houthis to receive Iranian weapons shipments.

News Analysis: Iran faces deep quandary over how to respond to Israel
Tracy Wilkinson, Ramin Mostaghim/Los Angeles Times/September 29, 2024min read
Iran faces a complex dilemma over whether to attack Israel directly or use its string of proxy
armies — as weakened as some of those now appear — to retaliate for the assassination of the head of the Lebanese Hezbollah militant and political organization. Diplomats, analysts and officials throughout the region and in the West agree that an all-out war between Iran and Israel would be devastating, quite likely more for the Islamic Republic than its archenemy. The fragile state of its economy and domestic politics is another motivation for Iran to hold its fire. But failure to forcefully avenge the decapitation of its most important proxy — its military and strategic "crown jewel" in the so-called Axis of Resistance that surrounds Israel — could suggest weakness and make followers in Lebanon, Iraq, Yemen and elsewhere question what Iranian support really means. The conundrum appears to have created a schism between some of Iran's top leaders, who are proceeding with caution, and its biggest hard-liners, who are demanding swift and decisive action. Israel's assassination Friday of Hassan Nasrallah, veteran leader of the powerful faction, came amid a steady onslaught of punishing attacks. Several top Hezbollah officials died alongside Nasrallah — along with Iranian Revolutionary Guard Gen. Abbas Nilforushan. On Saturday, according to Israeli and Hezbollah officials, Israel killed Nabil Kaouk, deputy head of Hezbollah's Central Council, the seventh senior Hezbollah leader slain in little over a week. The setbacks suffered by both Iran and its proxies "underscore intelligence and operational inferiority coupled with Israel's willingness to move up the escalation ladder," said Ali Vaez, head of the Iran project at the International Crisis Group. "Iran and its allies have no real way of countering the former, and in Tehran's case, reluctance to match the latter."
"Iran has always tried to push conflict away from its borders and play the long game," he added.
In Tehran on Sunday, grief-stricken Lebanese demanded revenge. But there also was a strong sentiment that retribution should be the work of an alliance of Muslim and other sympathetic forces, not Iran alone or even at the fore. Iran, experts say, always worked more effectively from behind the scenes, and could do so once again to help rebuild Hezbollah as it struggles to install new leadership and seal off security breaches and infiltrations.
"We must mobilize Islamic countries and the international community against Israel," Hamid Reza Teraqqi, deputy chair of the Islamic Coalition Party, the oldest Islamic party in Iran, said in an interview. "Negotiations with America will not help. Israeli must be confronted by forces, not by talks."He and others said Iran needed to improve its flagging economy, battered by Western sanctions, as well as an arsenal, which is lacking in sufficient cyber technology, AI and other military know-how to position itself against Israel, which is armed by the United States.
In the days before Nasrallah's killing, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian was at the United Nations, where he made conciliatory statements about a desire to renew negotiations with the West, possibly to renew talks aimed at curbing Iran's nuclear program in exchange for sanctions relief. Back in Tehran in the aftermath of Nasrallah's death, Pezeshkian on Sunday also seemed unwilling to escalate tensions, although he said that the U.S. was complicit in the attacks against Hezbollah because of its steady supply of weapons to Israel. He also said he was confident Hezbollah would secure new leadership.
Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, on social media, said Hezbollah "makes its own decision and is fully capable of defending itself, Lebanon and the people of Lebanon on its own."
That may be overly optimistic, but it reflects an enduring reluctance to proceed further down the warpath with Israel. Iran might also decide to grant a greater role to the Houthi militants in Yemen as part of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Quds Force strategy. The Houthis, fighting the Saudi-backed government of Yemen, have had success in recent months attacking and disrupting vessel traffic in the Red Sea as their way of expressing solidarity for Gazans. Iran might prioritize efforts to arm them with technologies that could increase the impact of those operations.
On Sunday, a day after Houthis said they fired a missile toward Israel's Ben Gurion airport, the Israeli military reported that its warplanes struck the Houthi strongholds of Ras Isa and Hudaydah in Yemen — hitting power plants and a seaport used to import oil.
The military was “determined to continue operating at any distance — near or far — against all threats to the citizens of the State of Israel,” it said in a statement. Houthi broadcaster Al-Masirah said that four people were killed and at least 30 wounded in the attack. On X, senior Houthi official Nasruddin Amer described the attack as a failure and said that an emergency plan activated earlier meant oil tanks were emptied before the raid.
“The Zionists will not stop our operations under any circumstances,” he wrote. “We will make them more qualitative.” What Iran does next will ultimately be decided by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, who so far has appeared supportive of Pezeshkian, a relative moderate.
Khamenei and Iran have reasons for avoiding a full-blown war with Israel. In addition to the struggling economy, many Iranians still suffer from the trauma of Iran's last major conflict, the war with Iraq in the 1980s that claimed hundreds of thousands of lives. Analysts say the aging ayatollah is sufficiently pragmatic to seek to avoid wider conflagration, as long as the proxies will be able to step up. In April, after Israel killed senior Iranian commanders in Syria, Iran retaliated with its first-ever direct attack on Israel. But the airstrike was calculatingly limited: The rockets and missiles were intercepted, and damage was minimal.
Iran would probably suffer more than Israel in an all-out war between the two sides, especially if Hezbollah, Iran's first line of defense against Israel, is significantly degraded. And economic strife and political uncertainty would make it more difficult for the current government to rebuild.
"Regime survival is #1," Karim Sadjadpour, a Middle East analyst at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said on X. "Khamenei is now in a dilemma of his own making. By not responding strongly, he keeps losing face. By responding too strongly, he could lose his head."
Still, another unknown component in any calculation of what Iran does next lies inside the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. He has shown little interest in easing his country's relentless bombardments on Lebanon and has rebuffed efforts by Washington and other powers to broker a cease-fire. If Netanyahu reads muted reaction from Tehran as lack of resolve, he may be tempted to pound Lebanon harder, proceed with tentative plans to launch a ground invasion and even expand the offensive into other spheres of Iran's influence. That could in turn dial up anger among the proxies who would stoke pressure on Tehran. Some groups like the Houthis in Yemen and pro-Iranian militias in Iraq and Syria might begin to question what good Iran's backing serves if it does not defend its most important allies, said Trita Parsi, an analyst at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft in Washington.
"Some may conclude there were no redlines for Iran in Lebanon," he said. "But if Israel is so confident that it takes the war not just into Lebanon but to Iran, then Iran may conclude, whether they want it or not, war with Israel is at their doorstep."Times staff writer Wilkinson reported from Washington and special correspondent Mostaghim from Tehran. Times staff writer Nabih Bulos in Beirut contributed to this report.

The Latest English LCCC analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources on September 29-30/2024
A War of Choice and a War of Necessity
Amir Taheri/Asharq Al Awsat/September 29/2024
Last week, on a single day of an undeclared war, one of the protagonists suffered more than 500 deaths and more than 1,600 wounded, a total of over 2,200 casualties. The country in question has a population of 5 million. Now imagine if that casulaty figure had occurred in a country with a population of say 90 million; the proportionate casualty figure would work out at a staggering 34,000. Well, as you guessed the first country mentioned is Lebanon. which has been dragged into a war on behalf of the second country that is to say the Islamic Republic in Iran.
I said dragged into a war because as everyone must know neither the Lebanese people nor what is still regarded as the Lebanese government were consulted on the wisdom let alone the desirability of triggering such a war.
The tragic episode has created a new category of war: kangaroo proxy war. In it, the proxy uses the territory of a nation with no interest in or desire for a war in order to protect and promote the real or imaginary of a distant master.
Broadly speaking, we know two kinds of wars: of choice and or of necessity. In a war of choice, a protagonist enters the foray by choice and in the absence of any pressure from necessity. The United States was sucked into the Vietnam War by choice as did the USSR in Afghanistan and more recently Russia in Ukraine. In none of those cases, the party that gate crashed into a civil war, as was the case in Vietnam and Afghanistan or triggered an unnecessary war as is the case in Ukraine faced any mortal danger or serious threat to its vital interests.
The war of necessity, however caused by a sentiment that a protagonist's vital interests, indeed even its very existence, may be in danger. Back to the current wars in our region. The October 7 attack on Israel by Hamas was a war of choice. Hamas was in no mortal danger from Israel, and Gaza was doing relatively better thanks to a fairly long period of calm, growing foreign investment and a tripling of Israeli work permits for Gazan seasonal workers. There wasn't the remotest possibility of Israel wishing to reconquer Gaza and dislodge Hamas.
In practical, that is to say non-ideological terms, Hamas could have chosen to live. with and profit from the status quo rather than seeking to upset it in a manner that forced the adversary into a war of necessity.
Israel's initial reaction to the October 7 attack was a war of necessity, at least in the field of geo-political perceptions. Israel was in the same situation that the US had been after 9/11. At that time, the US might have limited its response to a police operation to dislodge the Taliban and if possible capture Osama bin Laden and his senior associates without getting involved in a 20-year low intensity war with no discernible geopolitical benefit for America.
What had started as a war of necessity morphed into a war of choice when US Democrats, having declared the Iraq war "the wrong war" dubbed the imbroglio in Afghanistan "the right war."
Is Israel heading in the same direction by transforming a war of necessity into one of choice?It is too early to offer a definitive answer to that question. What is clear, however, is that the activities of Tehran's proxies in Yemen, Iraq and above all Lebanon encourage those in Israel who wish to transform a war of necessity into one choice with the ultimate goal of eliminating Hezbollah and, later why not, the Khomeinist regime in Tehran. Whichever way one looks at it, the war of choice that Hezbollah started by breaking the 2006 ceasefire accord and ignoring the 1701 UN resolution can't but lead to disaster for Tehran's Trojan Horse in Beirut. It will also provide Israel with a strong "self-defense" argument to justify pursuing the war in Gaza while Hassan Nasrallah claims he is bombarding northern Israel in support of his imaginary ally Yahya Sinwar crouched in his tunnel.
Paradoxically, dragging Lebanon into the foray makes it more difficult if not impossible for Sinwar, provided he is still alive, to accept any ceasefire deal. And even if he does, there is no guarantee that Israel would suddenly abandon a golden chance to cut Hezbollah down to size especially with assurances from Iran not to do anything consequential to protect its Lebanese protege. Nasrallah is two intelligent not to realize that he has been sold a bundle by Tehran. He became a tool in a war that was someone else's choice but is becoming his necessity.
Worse still Tehran media are already musing about changes in Hezbollah paving the path for a cynical blame game of the kind only mullahs made in Iran are capable of. Soft-soaping the gullible Americans, President Masoud Pezeshkian in New York conjured the peace dove out of his invisible turban. The subtext was: we can call back the hounds of war we unleashed

The Brink of an Expansive War and the Absence of Strategic Containment
Dr. Abdelhak Azzouzi/Asharq Al Awsat/September 29/2024
When we teach military strategy to university students, we do not solely focus on questions of superiority and military actions using tanks, airplanes, and missiles. Strategic containment is often crucial for effectiveness and achieving results. Here, I ask observers, specialists, and decision-makers to remember Kendo (the way of the sword), a practice that clearly reflects the theory of strategic containment:
“One day, an exhausted man carrying a weapon entered a small town looking for food and work. He found nothing to eat or drink.
Suddenly, he found himself facing a man carrying a gleaming sword. The man told him to meet the next day for a duel in the center of the town with everyone present.
The visitor inquired about this man, and he was told that the man was a fierce and powerful warrior- a strong and experienced sword fighter champion who had fought in wars and repelled every attack. Thus, the man went to the town's martial arts teacher. The teacher ordered him to pray the prayer of death, but he would not manage to learn the advanced combat skills needed to face the warrior in time. He also asked him to consult a clergyman to seek wisdom, and to remain motionless, close his eyes, recite his usual prayer during the duel, moving his lips without raising his voice...
The visitor understood nothing and assumed that he was fated to die a quick death. He was enraged by this advice, but the clergyman told him: "This is the only way to stay alive."
When the duel began, the warrior was astonished by the visitor's reaction. He saw a man with his eyes closed, sitting motionless, muttering incomprehensible prayers. The warrior, a thoughtful man, began to contemplate what this meant: the visitor must either be a fool, suicidal, or extremely powerful.
(If he is a fool, defeating him would not make me stronger or enhance my reputation. If he is suicidal, it would be foolish to help him. And if he is very strong, he could destroy me.)
As a result, the visitor settled permanently and comfortably in the small town and lived a long life."This meaningful story, which is taken from Sun Tzu's philosophy on the art of war, illustrates the genius of the strategy of not engaging in direct confrontation and seeking containment to ensure minimal cost with guaranteed results. The men who planned the Al-Aqsa Flood attack did not have this strategic genius. They believed that it would free the Palestinian prisoners languishing in Israeli prisons and modest Israeli military incursions and allow Hamas to make public and secret agreements that favor Hamas. If none of this happened, they thought that this war would spark a broader regional war, with everyone in the Resistance Axis adopting it as their own war and entering the fray. They believed Iran would be compelled to intervene, prompting international powers to rush in and pour water on the raging fire.
Based on these assumptions, Hamas thought it would become a domestic and regional actor that could overturn the international rules, compel enemies, and achieve unrivaled power. Hezbollah lacked this strategic genius, finding itself engulfed in a sea of tragedy. It began losing its cadres and leaders, its resilience, and its domestic and regional influence, especially after Israeli intelligence’s (Mossad) “pager attack.”
The Mossad planted small explosives inside thousands of pagers that Hezbollah had imported months earlier. This incident highlights the strength of Israeli intelligence and the weakness of Hezbollah's and Iran's surveillance and preemptive capabilities. This vulnerability allowed for precise targeting, such as the assassination of Hezbollah General Fuad Shukr in the southern suburbs of Beirut, the killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran itself, and the elimination of the Radwan Force (Hezbollah's elite forces) leadership as they held a meeting in the southern suburbs of Beirut.
This strategic precision terrifies Iran, which diligently and constantly reevaluates taking military actions against Israel. It accounts for the military superiority of the US and Israel, the potential destruction of its weapons and aircraft, and the infiltration of its systems since they know that the US and Israel possess fifth-generation weapons...In light of these facts, strategic containment- through the story that introduced our article and the parallels with some actors- could have yielded positive results. These calamities would not have occurred today, the region would not be moving further and further away from peace and security. Its problems would not be aggravating. We are facing difficult crises, a web of militias, anxious armies, border-crossing drones, fifth-generation technologies, and disparate forces and alliances.

Slaughter in Bangladesh and the International Cover-Up
Vijay Patel/Gatestone Institute/September 29, 2024
Muhammad Yunus is one of the major donors of Clinton Foundation, and according to a cable leaked by Wikileaks, back in 2007, Hillary Clinton made frantic bids and exerted pressure on Bangladesh Army to make her friend Yunus head of the then military-backed interim government.
[S]ince August 5, 2024, massive attacks on Hindus, including their homes, businesses and temples began, while local media were barred from covering these incidents, as the Yunus regime has been arresting critics and journalists and bringing murder cases against them.
As Yunus is enjoying full support of the Biden administration as well as Democratic Party leaders such as Barack Obama, Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton, none of the rights groups, including Amnesty International or Human Rights Watch has issued any statement pertaining attacks (including murder and rapes) on Hindus in the country. On August 5, 2024, Bangladesh Sheikh Hasina was forced to flee the country and take refuge in India following a month-long anti-government movement led by Jamaat-e-Islami (JeI), ultra-Islamist Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), Hizb Ut Tahrir and other Islamist organizations in the country. It was earlier perceived by many that the Biden administration had been trying to topple Sheikh Hasina from power and install Muhammad Yunus as head of the government.
Muhammad Yunus is one of the major donors of Clinton Foundation, and according to a cable leaked by Wikileaks, back in 2007, Hillary Clinton made frantic bids and exerted pressure on Bangladesh Army to make her friend Yunus head of the then military-backed interim government.
Following the ouster of Sheikh Hasina, Muhammad Yunus returned to Bangladesh on August 7, 2024 from France and on the subsequent day took oath as the "Chief Advisor" of the military-backed revolutionary regime. Meanwhile, since August 5, 2024, massive attacks on Hindus, including their homes, businesses and temples began, while local media were barred from covering these incidents, as the Yunus regime has been arresting critics and journalists and bringing murder cases against them.
As Yunus is enjoying full support of the Biden administration as well as Democratic Party leaders such as Barack Obama, Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton, none of the rights groups, including Amnesty International or Human Rights Watch has issued any statement pertaining attacks (including murder and rapes) on Hindus in the country.
Organizations such as Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) also did not issue any statement condemning the arrest of journalists and imprisoning them in murder cases.
On September 26, 2024, during his US visit to attend UNGA, Muhammed Yunus was accorded a reception by the Clinton Global Initiative, which was also attended by Bill Clinton. In this program, Bill Clinton applauded Mahfuz Alam, a leader of Hizb Ut Tahrir who led Islamist revolt in Bangladesh. Here is a video of the event. Here is one more related link to Mahfuz Alam's Hizb Ut Tahrir connections. Incidentally that Hizb Ut Tahrir is an anti-democracy Islamist outfit, which advocates establishment of a caliphate and is banned in Bangladesh and many other countries, including Britain and the United States.
*Vijay Patel is based in the Subcontinent.
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Netanyahu Ratchets Up Challenge to Iran With Nasrallah Death
Dan Williams, Peter Martin and Sam Dagher/Bloomberg/September 29, 2024
Its intelligence had long tracked Hassan Nasrallah and it recently learned he planned to move, which would have closed the window of opportunity, according to a senior official who asked not to be identified discussing confidential matters. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu gave the order Friday from his hotel room in New York, just before giving a fiery speech to the United Nations General Assembly that rejected a US-backed push for a cease-fire in Lebanon.
Washington, Israel’s closest ally, got only a last-minute heads up as its latest bid to stop the violence failed. Friday’s strike in southern Beirut was another in a series of dramatic Israeli attacks — from exploding pagers to sweeping air raids — that have left Iran’s main proxy severely debilitated and now leaderless.
After a week of appeals from world leaders at the UN to avoid the risk of all-out war in the Middle East, Israel seems to be doing just the opposite, its warplanes demolishing what Iran and Hezbollah had long set as red lines.
Still, judging by supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s first reaction, Iran is in no rush to escalate. President Masoud Pezeshkian also stopped short of pledging a direct and immediate attack on Israel — and in his international debut at the UN he struck a relatively restrained note.
The U.S. judges that Iran is unlikely to rush into a further escalation because its most valuable proxy — Hezbollah — has been weakened and its missiles and drones proved ineffective against Israel when it attacked directly in April, according to a person familiar with U.S. policy, who asked not to be identified because of the sensitivity of the matter. Both Hezbollah and Iran have been weakened by recent events and have few options, they said.
Netanyahu called Nasrallah’s death “necessary” to his quest to return Israelis in the north who had fled Hezbollah’s attacks over the last 11 months to their homes. But in a video address, he had a warning for his people: “In the coming days, we will face significant challenges.”
The US said it’s beefing up its already-substantial military presence in the region, a clear signal to Tehran about the risk of reacting too aggressively. If they were angry at Israel for the lack of warning of the strike, US officials weren’t sorry to see the death of Nasrallah and the setbacks for Hezbollah, which has killed hundreds of Americans in its four-decade history.
As Israel has pummeled Iranian proxies in Gaza and Lebanon since the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas that killed more than 1,000 Israelis, Tehran’s reaction so far hasn’t spiraled into a broader regional war. A major missile attack in the spring did little damage. Iran seems deterred for the moment by the superior militaries of Israel and its US ally.“Tehran’s vaunted missile force was shown in April to be ineffective against U.S. and Israeli technology,” said Michael Morell, the former acting director of the Central Intelligence Agency, in an interview. “Now Iran’s second pillar of deterrence – Hezbollah – is being destroyed in front of its eyes. What does that leave them? Where does Iran find deterrence? Perhaps they will seek it in the acquisition of nuclear weapons.”Two Israeli officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Hezbollah still has military capabilities and missiles but with its leadership gone, it’s in crisis and may take time to retaliate. Still, Israel’s military is poised and expecting retaliation as early as Saturday night and preparing for a possible ground operation in Lebanon.
A person familiar with US thinking said it’s hard to predict just how a headless Hezbollah might try to respond, though the group will clearly seek vengeance. The person said the Israeli strikes obviously complicate Washington’s hopes for a cease-fire, with risks of miscalculation growing as each side tries to get in the final blows before any possible deal.
Jordan, Egypt and Gulf states like Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain are happy to see groups like Hamas and now Hezbollah — both classified by the US and the European Union as terrorists — dealt big blows, according to a person who liaises with Arab and Western intelligence services and asked not to be identified to give a candid assessment. The goal, ultimately, is to push Shiite Iran back, regaining the initiative and shifting decision-making in the region to majority-Sunni states. But Netanyahu’s open defiance of Washington’s calls for restraint has raised fears in some Arab capitals that Israel isn’t accountable to anyone, not even the US, which is its chief arms supplier, the person said.
If Iran does something rash, the US may not be able to control Israel’s response, said one Arab official. The mounting civilian death toll in the Gaza Strip — where Israel is trying to eradicate Hamas — and now in Lebanon — where Hezbollah is based — has put Arab leaders in a bind given where the sympathies of their populations lie. The US renewed calls for a diplomatic solution Saturday. Just over a month from a razor-close presidential election, the worsening violence is a growing political challenge for Vice President Kamala Harris in her race against former President Donald Trump. As Netanyahu made his way back on the Jewish Sabbath, his plane was escorted by two F-35 fighter jets — a sign of some of the heightened security measures the Israelis were taking. The US meanwhile has ordered back some of its diplomats and flights to Beirut have been suspended as the conflict escalates.
With the one-year mark of the Oct. 7 attack nearing, Netanyahu was under pressure both at home and abroad. Families of hostages taken by Hamas want them returned and press for a deal while his far-right coalition partners threaten to topple his government if he buckles.
Killing Nasrallah was essential to Israel’s goal of “changing the balance of power in the region for years,” Netanyahu said. In addition, he said, the more Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, still hiding in Gaza, “sees that Hezbollah will no longer come to his rescue, the greater the chances of recovering our hostages.”