English LCCC Newsbulletin For Lebanese, Lebanese Related, Global News & Editorials
For  April 08/2026
Compiled & Prepared by: Elias Bejjani
#elias_bejjani_news

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Bible Quotations For today
When you were younger you dressed yourself and went where you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go
John21/14-25/When they had finished eating, Jesus said to Simon Peter, “Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?”“Yes, Lord,” he said, “you know that I love you.”Jesus said, “Feed my lambs.” Again Jesus said, “Simon son of John, do you love me?”He answered, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.”Jesus said, “Take care of my sheep.” The third time he said to him, “Simon son of John, do you love me?”Peter was hurt because Jesus asked him the third time, “Do you love me?” He said, “Lord, you know all things; you know that I love you.”Jesus said, “Feed my sheep. Very truly I tell you, when you were younger you dressed yourself and went where you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go.” Jesus said this to indicate the kind of death by which Peter would glorify God. Then he said to him, “Follow me!” Peter turned and saw that the disciple whom Jesus loved was following them. (This was the one who had leaned back against Jesus at the supper and had said, “Lord, who is going to betray you?”) When Peter saw him, he asked, “Lord, what about him?” Jesus answered, “If I want him to remain alive until I return, what is that to you? You must follow me.” Because of this, the rumor spread among the believers that this disciple would not die. But Jesus did not say that he would not die; he only said, “If I want him to remain alive until I return, what is that to you?” This is the disciple who testifies to these things and who wrote them down. We know that his testimony is true. Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written.

Titles For Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on April 07-08/2026
Opportunism and baseness are born within the rulers, the Official, the double-dealing partisan politicians so called political parties, and many of the Iscariot-like clerics... they all suckle subservience with their mother's milk./Elias Bejjani/April 06/2026
It truly is a time of cowardice and cowards/Elias Bejjani/April 05/2026
Joseph Aoun’s last refuge is silence and prayer, and fear of the Final Judgment Day/Elias Bejjani/April 05/2026
Papal Nuncio to Border Residents: We Hope You Will Feel Great Joy
Papal Nuncio Unable to Reach Dibil Due to Intensified Shelling
UN probe finds Israeli fire, Hezbollah IED killed peace
Israel Urges All Vessels to Evacuate South Lebanon Maritime Area up to Tyre
Israel Military Says Completed Forward Deployment in South Lebanon
The Iranian Terrorist Proxy Hinders The Delivery Of Humanitarian Aid to Resilient Communities in Southern Lebanon/Colonel Charbel Barakat/April 07/2026
Lebanon Becomes an Alternate Arena for Iran’s Revolutionary Guards after Assad’s Fall
Anger, Sorrow at Funeral of Lebanese Forces Official Killed by Israel
Lebanon death toll in Israel-Hezbollah war surpasses 1,500
Vatican envoy's aid convoy to south Lebanon retreats after taking fire
Aoun 'will not allow' anyone to accuse South Lebanon’s Christians of 'treason'
Israel military says completed forward deployment in south Lebanon
Hezbollah says clashing with Israeli troops in Bint Jbeil
Israel strikes south and east after warning more than 40 towns
Doctors warn that Israel is targeting Lebanon's health care system, as it did in Gaza
US Stops Israel’s Plan to Drag Syria to War on Hezbollah
Israeli Threats Shut Masnaa Crossing, Partly Isolate Lebanon from Syria
'We just want to stay home': A Lebanese village under Israeli occupation
Israeli goals in Lebanon war shift from imminently disarming Hezbollah to reestablishing South Lebanon Security Zone/David Daoud/FDD's Long War Journal/April 07/2026
Links to several important news websites

Titles For The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on April 07-08/2026
US and Iran agree to 2-week ceasefire as Trump seizes diplomatic offramp
Trump says he has agreed to two-week ceasefire with Iran
Iran Signals Long Multi-Front War as Trump Deadline Nears
Trump weighs plea for Iran deadline extension
Iran Signals Long Multi-Front War as Trump Deadline Nears
US has struck Iranian military targets on Kharg Island. Here’s what we know about it
China and Russia veto UN resolution on protecting Hormuz shipping
China, Russia sink UN vote on Strait of Hormuz; 10 countries join US in support
Iran has attacked Saudi Arabia's Jubail petrochemical complex, IRGC says
Netanyahu says Israel struck railways, bridges in Iran
US, Israel strike Iran petrochemicals hub
JD Vance On Call for Iran Backup After Trump Given Ultimatum
Iran-backed Iraqi armed group release kidnapped US journalist
Qatar says four wounded after Iran launches barrage against Gulf states
Bahrain’s main port to temporarily suspend operations from early Wednesday
Kuwait interior ministry urges residents to stay in starting from midnight
Links to several television channels and newspapers

Titles For The Latest English LCCC analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on April 07-08/2026
Germany's 'National Interest' and Fragile Support for Israel/Nils A. Haug and Gerhard Werner Schlicke/Gatestone Institute/April 7, 2026
Iran Is More of the Enemy of the Arabs Than the Gulf/Mamdouh al-Muhainy/Asharq Al-Awsat/April 07/2026
Us… And Israel in Its ‘Kahanist’ Era!/Eyad Abu Shakra/Asharq Al-Awsat/April 07/2026
War And Neglecting ‘the Day After’/Nabil Amr/Asharq Al-Awsat/April 07/2026
X Platform & Facebook Selected twittes on April 07/2026

The Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on April 07-08/2026
Opportunism and baseness are born within the rulers, the Official, the double-dealing partisan politicians so called political parties, and many of the Iscariot-like clerics... they all suckle subservience with their mother's milk.
Elias Bejjani/April 06/2026
https://eliasbejjaninews.com/2026/04/8899/
A dog’s tail stays crooked even if you put it in a mold for a hundred years; a pig, no matter how much it washes, returns to wallow in the mud; and a dog licks up its own vomit. Such is the state of the politicians, the merchant-owners of "so called political parties, and many of the "men of the cloth" and the lowly ones—those degraded in their morals, their infidelity, and their Trojan-horse nature. They cannot change because filth, decadence, the death of conscience, the killing of the grace of shame within them, and opportunism are nested in their blood—even though they have no "blood" (honor) in them.
In Lebanon, there is an evil political school for filth and meanness. It graduates a miserable breed of politicians with no feeling and no shame; when people spit on them, they say, "It’s raining." This breed of politicians and political paties owners, merchants are the ones who delivered Lebanon into the arms of Palestinian, Syrian, and Iranian occupations. They ruined the country, stole the people’s money, displaced them, and filled the world with trash. These ruffians preach virtue while they are drowning in obscenity, debauchery, collaboration, humiliation, and dirt.
Shame on every citizen, politician, political party owner, official, ruler, and cleric who has no dignity or honor—whose only concern is power, money, and influence at the expense of their people and homeland. Money, power, and sex expose the inner truth of every human, and these people are all cowering, kneeling slaves to these three maladies.
Even worse than these "great" leaders are the herds, the cheerleaders, and the henchmen among our own people who follow them... these idol-worshippers whose necks are tied with the ropes of dependency and humiliation.
We cannot forget today, with the Resurrection of Christ, those who falsely and deceitfully claim to be "sovereignists" against Hezbollah—its weapons, occupation, and crimes. These very people, before the defeats of the terrorist Hezbollah and the assassination of its leaders, used to boast that their "martyrs" were like Hezbollah’s, that Hezbollah was a "Resistance" that liberated the South, and that it is a "Lebanese demographic" whose problems should be solved "locally/domestically." They never dared to mention UN resolutions  1995. 1701, 1680. Today they play the hero, but their wretched essence hasn't changed and never will.
In short, all these politicians, these "trashy political party" owners, all the rulers, and many of the clerics are the children of the Devil. They suckled filth and opportunism with their milk; they live and die this way, and no matter how high they rise, they remain lowly.
In summary, Lebanon cannot rise with these people. For Lebanon to rise, The Lebanese people must cast out these "Trojan" crews, confiscate their wealth and property, and put them on trial.

It truly is a time of cowardice and cowards
Elias Bejjani/April 05/2026
Today was marked by the crocodile tears of our shepherd, and by the slaughter of the grace of shame through the blatant dhimmitude of our president. Yet, the Lebanon of holiness remains innocent of their Iscariotism.

Joseph Aoun’s last refuge is silence and prayer, and fear of the Final Judgment Day
Elias Bejjani/April 05/2026
It is almost certain, in the view of a wide segment of the Lebanese—both at home and in the diaspora—that everything Joseph Aoun will say today on the anniversary of Christ’s Resurrection will lack national, sovereign, constitutional, and Maronite value. This is because words that are not followed by actions are scattered dust. As the Holy Bible teaches us in the Epistle of Saint James: “Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead” (James 2:17).
Since the man’s path, beginning with the “oath speech,” has lacked the actions that embody those promises, his words today will be nothing more than an echo of emptiness in truth and credibility, and a manipulation of the “Word,” which is God who became incarnate and became man, as stated in the Gospel of Saint John: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God… And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:1–14).
Personally, sincerely I wish that Aoun would spend his day today in Bkerki, praying, silent, and seeking forgiveness, because his tongue has never reflected the aspirations of the free, but rather has spoken—and continues to speak—the agendas of Hezbollah, the terrorist enemy of Lebanon and the Lebanese, and Nabih Berri, who is corrupt and a fomenter of strife, and among those who have deliberately and knowingly worked toward the destruction and downfall of the country.
What is required of Aoun—Maronite, Lebanese, and constitutionally—is that he respect, even if only once, his position, his oath, and the aspirations of the free and sovereign Lebanese people. Yet he surrounds himself with an army of “jihadist,” fundamentalist, and opportunistic advisors—most of whom come from the school of Michel Aoun, who has fallen joyfully into the temptations of “Lucifer,” the king of demons—and with individuals hostile to Lebanon and everything Lebanese, belonging to Hezbollah, the Amal Movement, the Syrian Social Nationalist Party, and groups resembling the scribes and Pharisees, as well as merchants and  people of financial interests.
What is required of Aoun is not to make matters worse through empty rhetoric that debases the word, especially since he assumed the presidency through a Parliament whose legitimacy and legality are contested. We remind those who are celebrating what he will say today that he “will not perform miracles,” particularly in light of many files surrounded by questions… and God knows best.
In conclusion, if Aoun speaks—and we hope he does not, so as not to further disappoint people—he will not dare to align himself with the constitution or international resolutions, nor will he call things by their proper names. Meanwhile, all his previous positions have lacked any real action confronting Hezbollah’s terrorism, its weapons, and its Persian domination over the state. Likewise, all his approaches, proposals, and initiatives have been submissive, appeasing Berri’s corruption and avoiding confrontation with the brazenness, indecency, and moral corruption of Hezbollah’s leaders.
Before  concluding, I, ask: will the Holy Spirit descend upon Joseph Aoun today and command the security forces and the army to enter the Iranian embassy, expel the insolent ambassador, and sever diplomatic relations between Lebanon and Iran?
Will we be surprised today by a different Joseph Aoun than the one we have known for years? Perhaps only if the Holy Spirit comes upon him and he decides, in repentance, to cast off the garment of appeasing Berri and flattering the “Party of Satan, Hezbollah,” and arm himself with patriotism, courage, and the faith of “al-Bashir.” However, these hopes will most likely not be fulfilled, because his path so far has been in a different direction. Accordingly, the man’s last refuge remains silence, prayer, and fear of the Final Judgment Day.

Papal Nuncio to Border Residents: We Hope You Will Feel Great Joy
Al-Markazia/April 7, 2026
Papal Nuncio Paolo Borgia addressed the residents of the border towns, saying, "We hope that amidst the sorrow and mourning, you will feel a great joy that comes from heaven and cannot be taken from you." The papal nuncio had set out this morning towards the southern border villages to support the Christian villages. Due to the exchange of fire and the intensification of clashes in the area between Israeli forces and Hezbollah, he was unable to visit Dibil, and was forced to return after waiting for more than two hours in the town of Al-Tayri, near Bint Jbeil.

Papal Nuncio Unable to Reach Dibil Due to Intensified Shelling
Al-Markazia/April 7, 2026
Papal Nuncio Paolo Borgia was unable to visit the town of Dibil, and was forced to return after waiting for more than two hours in the town of Al-Tayri, near Bint Jbeil. It was reported that the inability to cross was due to the mutual shelling and intensification of clashes in the area between enemy forces and Hezbollah, which prevented the completion of the visit.

UN probe finds Israeli fire, Hezbollah IED killed peace
AFP/07 April/2026
Three UN peacekeepers who died in two separate incidents in Lebanon in March were likely killed by Israeli tank fire in one case and by a Hezbollah improvised explosive device (IED) in the other, according to a United Nations probe.“We have requested with the relevant parties that the cases be investigated and prosecuted by national authorities to bring the perpetrators to justice and ensure criminal accountability for crimes against peacekeepers,” Stephane Dujarric, spokesman for the UN secretary-general, told reporters on Tuesday.

Israel Urges All Vessels to Evacuate South Lebanon Maritime Area up to Tyre
Asharq Al-Awsat/April 07/2026
The Israeli military on Tuesday urged all vessels in the maritime zone off the coast of southern Lebanon to immediately head north of the city of Tyre, warning that it would operate in the area. "Hezbollah's activities expose naval vessels in the maritime area between Tyre and Ras al-Naqoura to danger, which compels the Israeli army to take action against it in the maritime domain," the military's Arabic-language spokesman Avichay Adraee posted on X. "To ensure your safety, all anchored or sailing naval vessels in the specified maritime area shown on the navigation map must immediately proceed north of the Tyre area," he added.

Israel Military Says Completed Forward Deployment in South Lebanon
Asharq Al-Awsat/April 07/2026
The Israeli military said on Tuesday it had completed the deployment of ground troops along a "defense line" in southern Lebanon, where it is fighting Iran-backed Hezbollah. The military has not given any geographical details on the furthest point to which its soldiers have advanced into Lebanese territory. Israeli media reported that the military did not intend at this stage to push troops deeper than around 20 kilometers (12 miles) north of the Israel-Lebanon border. "At this stage, soldiers have completed their deployment along the anti-tank missile defense line and continue to operate in the area in order to strengthen the forward defensive posture and remove threats to the residents and communities of northern Israel," a military statement said. Defense minister Israel Katz has said on several occasions in recent weeks that Israel intends to establish a "security zone" in southern Lebanon extending to the Litani river, which flows as much as 30 kilometers from the Israel-Lebanon border, in order to prevent rocket, drone or missile fire at northern Israeli communities. The Israeli daily Yediot Aharonot reported that the military was expected to present to the government "an operational plan for controlling the first line of (Lebanese) villages as a deep security zone up to the anti-tank line". Israeli newspaper Haaretz, citing military sources, reported that the military was "preparing to boost its forces in southern Lebanon, but there are currently no plans to advance deeper into the country". "The sources said the forces have reached what has been defined as the 'front line' outlined in the approved operational plans," Haaretz reported, adding that "this line includes southern villages located roughly 10 kilometers from the Litani River, an area under Israeli military control". Haaretz reported that the current deployment was aimed at preventing anti-tank missile fire on northern Israeli communities. These anti-tank missiles have an estimated range of around 10 kilometers.

The Iranian Terrorist Proxy Hinders The Delivery Of Humanitarian Aid to Resilient Communities in Southern Lebanon
Colonel Charbel Barakat/April 07/2026
https://eliasbejjaninews.com/2026/04/153506/
The Papal Nuncio in Lebanon, Paolo Borgia, recently organized several humanitarian convoys, escorted by UN and Lebanese Army forces, to deliver essential medical supplies, food, and fuel to isolated villages in the south. From the outset of the conflict, these villages chose to remain steadfast, refusing entry to armed groups to avoid becoming targets. Their message was clear: this was not their war. They refused to be depopulated or left vulnerable to bombardment.
Despite their resolve, these villages faced immense pressure—even from a government that had promised the army would remain to prevent harassment and secure necessities. However, as the conflict intensified, the army withdrew. In places like Alma al-Shaab, authorities even pressured residents to evacuate under the pretext of the Israeli threat. We will not recount every detail, nor will we formally indict a state that failed to prevent the entire country from being dragged into a war in which it had no stake.
While leaders claimed a policy of non-participation, an Iranian-backed group brazenly declared war in retaliation for Khamenei, launching missiles and drones in open coordination with the Revolutionary Guard. Despite this, the Lebanese people recognized the plight of these steadfast southerners, offering support and praising their heroic stance. This collective resilience eventually forced the Israelis to acknowledge their decision to remain. While initial strikes made no distinction—resulting in the needless deaths of martyrs from these villages—the reality was eventually accepted, and efforts were made to minimize harm to the civilian population without altering combat tactics.
Today, the Papal Nuncio was scheduled to celebrate Easter Mass with the people of Dibil, but ongoing skirmishes made this impossible. Undeterred, the convoy set off this morning. At the town of Hadatha, a vehicle belonging to the Iranian-backed party deliberately intercepted the convoy, disregarding UN instructions. This provocation prompted an Israeli drone strike on the vehicle. After a delay in Al-Tayri to await clearance, the aid was eventually delivered; however, the Papal Nuncio was forced to return to Beirut.
The Lebanese media, the government, and the UN will likely remain silent on these events, much as they attempted to obscure the discovery of a slain Iranian operative in Ain Saadeh. Official reports often focus on minor incidents—like the motorcycle runaway—to mask the true nature of these events. We saw similar patterns at the Comfort Hotel in Hazmieh to hide the killing of an IRGC operative and the following missile attacks in Keserwan. It appears the role of state institutions has shifted from protecting citizens to providing cover for the Revolutionary Guard. Those in power boast of "preventing strife," yet they only stifle the victim while allowing the aggressor to roam free.
Leadership, whether civil or religious, requires the courage to bear responsibility. True stability comes from investigating the instigators of conflict, not from silencing the population with platitudes. Today, shelters are overflowing with weapons, and armed groups exert control over the villages housing the displaced. These groups exploit misfortune to serve foreign masters, hoping to turn Lebanon into a sanctuary for those fleeing Iran should the current regime fall. As the late Said Akl once suggested, and as Abu Arz recorded in the Guardians of the Cedars' Testament, Lebanon desperately needs heroic and visionary leaders who prioritize the nation above all else. Only then can Lebanon survive a world striving to eradicate terrorism and religious fanaticism. The establishment of humanitarian corridors for our besieged people is a necessity we must advance. If the state remains preoccupied with foreign interests, unable to secure even a simple route, we cannot ask our people to survive on prayer alone. The diaspora must consider organizing aid through any means necessary—including alternative paths that have been closed for over a quarter-century.

Lebanon Becomes an Alternate Arena for Iran’s Revolutionary Guards after Assad’s Fall
Beirut: Asharq Al Awsat/April 07/2026
A multi-layered structure run by Iran’s Revolutionary Guards is taking shape in Lebanon, spanning Lebanese and Palestinian arms across intertwined security, military, and political roles. The model echoes Syria before the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime in 2024, raising fears that Lebanon is shifting from a traditional battleground into a more complex hub for managing conflict and influence. As signs of this overlap grow, Israel Defense Forces Radio said on Monday that an attempted assassination on Sunday in a Beirut apartment targeted a member of the “Palestine Corps,” linked to the Revolutionary Guards’ external arm, the Quds Force. Israel has previously said it killed several Iranian figures in Lebanon, including two strikes on “central commanders in the Lebanon Corps,” affiliated with the Quds Force and operating in Beirut. One strike hit the Ramada Hotel in Raouche. On March 11, the Israeli military said it targeted Hisham Abdel Karim Yassin, describing him as “a senior commander in Hezbollah’s communications unit, and in the Palestine Corps of the Quds Force.”A Palestinian source in Lebanon told Asharq Al-Awsat the Iran-linked structure resembles a parent body branching into multiple formations, with the Quds Force at its core. Local and Palestinian arms operate under different names for organizational and media purposes. The structure extends beyond the Shiite base tied to Hezbollah, incorporating groups from other communities, including Sunni elements integrated into parallel formations similar to the Resistance Brigades, alongside carefully organized Palestinian frameworks. “The Palestinian cover is essential,” the source said, adding that the aim is to avoid portraying Hezbollah as acting alone, instead projecting a broader alliance of Palestinian and Islamic factions to boost legitimacy and reduce Hezbollah’s domestic isolation.
Concealment
Names such as “Lebanon Corps” and “Palestine Corps” reflect composition, and are not arbitrary, the source said. The Lebanon Corps refers to Lebanese members from outside the Shiite community, while the Palestine Corps includes fighters from Palestinian factions, both Islamist groups such as Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and non-Islamist factions. The labels also serve as concealment tools, adopted after older structures were exposed, allowing networks to reorganize and evade monitoring. With Iran’s reduced ability to use Syria as before, in terms of movement and deployment, the base of operations was moved to Lebanon, the source said. Lebanon is now used as an alternative arena in practice, an advanced platform for managing confrontation, not just a support front. Its geography next to Israel, its complex environment offering multiple Lebanese, Palestinian, and Sunni covers, and an existing military structure all support this shift. The change has moved the role from logistical support in Syria to direct operational management from inside Lebanon. The country is now treated as “the most sensitive and valuable geography in this axis,” both for confrontation with Israel and as a pivot for escalation or negotiations.
Multiple structures, unified command
Political writer Ali al-Amine said Iran-linked structures in Lebanon span multiple levels and labels but converge under the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, particularly through the Quds Force.
Some groups are directly tied to the Quds Force, while others operate under a Palestinian banner, often composed of Palestinian members, each with its own role and title. “These individuals are organizationally linked to the Revolutionary Guards, but are not necessarily Iranian,” he said. “They can be Lebanese or Palestinian, while their direct leadership reference lies within the Guards, not local frameworks.”He added that some figures classified within Hezbollah are in fact closer organizationally to the Revolutionary Guards, highlighting overlap between Lebanese and Iranian roles. The Palestine Corps manages ties with Iran-linked Palestinian factions, while the Lebanon Corps handles the Lebanese arena. “What is known as the Lebanon Corps is not a traditional military force, but an administrative, coordinating and supervisory body directly linked to the Revolutionary Guards, while field execution remains with Hezbollah,” he said. He added that the Revolutionary Guards have long maintained a direct presence inside Hezbollah through representatives across financial, security, military, and social sectors, ensuring oversight and influence. These figures typically fall under the Quds Force, responsible for operations outside Iran. Al-Amine said Lebanon has become a primary arena for the Revolutionary Guards after Iran’s loss of the Syrian theater, explaining Tehran’s strong commitment to maintaining its influence. “Iran will strongly defend this influence, because losing Lebanon would be a strategic blow and would directly affect its regional position,” he said. He said a key part of the current conflict centers on Iran’s efforts to entrench its influence in Lebanon and prevent its erosion, whether through the Revolutionary Guards, Hezbollah, or affiliated networks, as it seeks to preserve its regional role and leverage.

Anger, Sorrow at Funeral of Lebanese Forces Official Killed by Israel
Asharq Al-Awsat/April 07/2026
At a church in the mountains outside Beirut, Raymonda Mouawad raged as she buried her brother, killed by an Israeli strike in a war against Hezbollah that he had nothing to do with. "We shouldn't be forced to bear the guilt of others' mistakes," she said, her voice filled with anger and sorrow. "We're done with Israel and Hezbollah. That's all I want to say," she told AFP at the church, which was overflowing with hundreds of family members, friends and supporters. Pierre Mouawad, a local official in the Lebanese Forces (LF) -- which is strongly opposed to Hezbollah -- was killed on Easter Sunday along with his wife Flavia and another woman. The Israeli strike on a residential building in Ain Saadeh, east of Beirut, was the latest attack outside Hezbollah's traditional strongholds since the armed group drew Lebanon into the Middle East war on March 2 with rocket fire towards Israel in support of its backer Iran.
That attack sparked an Israeli invasion and air raids across Lebanon that have killed more than 1,500 people, according to authorities.
Sectarian tensions -
The couple's coffins, draped in LF flags, arrived in Mouawad's hometown of Yahshoush in a packed procession to the deafening sound of automatic gunfire and fireworks as mourners threw rice and flower petals. LF anthems blared in the church courtyard, where some men in military-style garb stood among the mourners. Israel's strikes in majority-Christian and Sunni areas, including on hotels or apartments reportedly rented by people displaced by fighting, have stoked fear and division in a country where sectarian tensions have previously ended in bloodshed.
"We opened our homes to them... and in the end they came among us to harm us," said Raymonda, referring to people who have fled the majority-Shiite areas of Lebanon where Israeli strikes are most intense. But Lebanon's army said Monday that its investigation showed there were "no new tenants" in the targeted building. Investigations are ongoing "to uncover the circumstances of the Israeli attack", the army said, warning that speculation over "sensitive security matters... could lead to domestic tensions". Israel's military has said it struck a "terrorist target" east of Beirut, and was reviewing the incident after "reports of casualties among Lebanese civilians". President Joseph Aoun said in a statement on Tuesday that some were "exploiting fears of sectarian strife to serve their own interests", adding: "I will not allow strife."
LF leader Samir Geagea, who sent flowers to the funeral, said that "the Israelis were targeting a member of the Quds Force", the Iranian Revolutionary Guards' foreign operations arm, but he did not seem to have been killed.
- 'We don't want war' -
"Where is the state? There is no oversight, there's nothing, there are just lies," Raymonda said.
Nurse Fadia Mrad Atallah, 55, a friend of the couple's, said she was shocked by the news of their deaths. "We've had enough bloodshed. We don't want war," she said. "Whoever wants to wage war should go to Iran," she added. Sam Hanna, 56, showed a series of missed calls from Pierre Mouawad on Sunday as he and his friend tried to arrange for a coffee meetup that would never happen. "I told him, I can't, I have to pick my wife up from work, I'll come down and meet you at 7:00 pm. He told me he'd be waiting for me. I wish I had told him to come."
Scrolling through photos of them together, Hanna asked who his friend had died for. "For Khamenei? No, his blood can't have been spilled for this," he said, referring to Iran's slain supreme leader. Another friend, Marwan Khoury, 53, showed a video of his "last journey" with Mouawad -- accompanying his coffin inside the hearse. "It wasn't Pierre's time," he said. "Neither him nor anyone else should go like this."

Lebanon death toll in Israel-Hezbollah war surpasses 1,500
Agence France Presse/April 07/2026
Lebanon's health ministry said Tuesday that the death toll in more than a month of war between Israel and Hezbollah had reached 1,530.The toll includes 102 women and 130 children, as well as 57 heath workers, a ministry statement said, adding that 4,812 people have been wounded.

Vatican envoy's aid convoy to south Lebanon retreats after taking fire
Agence France Presse/April 07/2026
An aid convoy organized by the Vatican envoy to Lebanon headed for Christian villages in the country's south had to turn back on Tuesday after it came under fire, a security source told AFP. Apostolic Nuncio Paolo Borgia, who was travelling in the convoy, was being escorted by French peacekeepers from the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), and was en route to the village of Debl near the Israeli border, the source told AFP on condition of anonymity. His convoy came under fire as it approached border villages, with vehicles sustaining damage but no casualties reported, according to the source, who is on the ground in south Lebanon.A number of Christian-majority villages near the border, including Debl, have been caught up in the fighting between Israel and Hezbollah.Lebanon was drawn into the wider Middle East war on March 2 when Hezbollah fired rockets at Israel in support of its backer Iran.
Israel has responded with heavy strikes and a ground invasion in the country's south. The source said that after several attempts to proceed, the convoy finally turned back after an unidentified projectile exploded nearby. The state-run National News Agency reported that the convoy turned around after waiting more than two hours near the border town of Bint Jbeil "due to exchanges of fire and the intensification of fighting". Residents of Christian villages have been refusing to leave despite the Israeli army's advance and sweeping evacuation orders for swathes of south Lebanon. The villagers say it is not their war and that they feel abandoned after the Lebanese Army withdrew from several border locations. In Rmeish, another frontier village, the local municipality has launched a campaign on social media seeking donations of basic necessities including medication and baby formula. Borgia had organized previous aid convoys to Christian border villages since the war erupted. A visit planned for Sunday was canceled for security reasons.

Aoun 'will not allow' anyone to accuse South Lebanon’s Christians of 'treason'
Naharnet/April 07/2026
President Joseph Aoun said Tuesday that he will not allow strike to occur in war-hit Lebanon. "Anyone attempting to fuel such a trend — whether through social media or media outlets — poses a danger to Lebanon and is committing an act worse than the Israeli attacks," he said, adding that no one can afford to endure internal strife. "During my term, I will not allow anyone to accuse (Christian) citizens who remained steadfast in their villages and towns (in south Lebanon) of collaboration or treason," Aoun said, calling again for negotiations to end the Israeli war. Hezbollah supporters often label those who demand the group’s disarmament as "traitors" or "collaborators," arguing that dissent during wartime weakens Lebanon and helps Israel. Aoun has called for direct negotiations with Israel, a move also criticized by Hezbollah and its supporters who consider it a surrender and a form of normalization.
"My negotiation initiative has gained international support as it is the right path toward a solution," he said. Mayors of several Christian towns in southern Lebanon said the Israeli military had ordered them to force out the displaced who had escaped their Shia-majority towns, during the war. The residents of these towns refuse to evacuate, insisting they are not a party to the war between Israel and Hezbollah. Lebanon was drawn into the Middle East war on March 2 when Tehran-backed Hezbollah attacked Israel in response to the killing of Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in U.S.-Israeli strikes. President Aoun and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam have condemned Hezbollah's attacks, and the government later banned Hezbollah's military and security activity, in an unprecedented move as Israel retaliated to rocket fire.

Israel military says completed forward deployment in south Lebanon
Agence France Presse/April 07/2026
The Israeli military said on Tuesday it had completed the deployment of ground troops along a "defense line" in southern Lebanon, where it is fighting Hezbollah. A Lebanese military source said the Israeli army had advanced to a depth of between five and nine kilometers inside Lebanese territory. Israel's military has not given any geographical details on the furthest point to which its soldiers have advanced into Lebanon. Israeli media reported that the military did not intend at this stage to push troops deeper than around 20 kilometers north of the border.
"At this stage, IDF soldiers have completed their deployment along the anti-tank missile defense line and continue to operate in the area in order to strengthen the forward defensive posture and remove threats to the residents and communities of northern Israel," a military statement said.
Defense Minister Israel Katz has said on several occasions in recent weeks that Israel intends to establish a "security zone" in southern Lebanon extending to the Litani river, which flows as much as 30 kilometers from the Israel-Lebanon border, in order to prevent rocket, drone or missile fire at northern Israeli communities.
'Preparing to boost its forces' -
The Lebanese military source told AFP on condition of anonymity that Israeli troops had advanced to a depth of around nine kilometers in the coastal area, reaching the town of Bayyada. In the central sector of the border, troops have reached five kilometers inside Lebanon, the source said. In the east, "the Israeli army has reached a depth of seven kilometers", the source added, saying that Israeli troops also controlled the strategic town of Khiam. "Huge explosions" have been heard from the area where Israeli troops have invaded, the source said. Lebanon's army has withdrawn from these areas in order to avoid a confrontation. A security source on the ground told AFP that Israeli troops are now stationed at points overlooking areas where they have advanced, including in Bayyada. A statement from Hezbollah said its fighters were clashing with Israeli troops on the eastern outskirts of Bint Jbeil, which saw fierce fighting in previous wars. The Israeli daily Yediot Aharonot reported that the military was expected to present to the government "an operational plan for controlling the first line of (Lebanese) villages as a deep security zone up to the anti-tank line". Israeli newspaper Haaretz, citing military sources, reported that the military was "preparing to boost its forces in southern Lebanon, but there are currently no plans to advance deeper into the country". "The sources said the forces have reached what has been defined as the 'front line' outlined in the approved operational plans," Haaretz reported, adding that "this line includes southern villages located roughly 10 kilometers from the Litani river, an area under Israeli military control". Haaretz also reported that the current deployment was aimed at preventing anti-tank missile fire on northern Israeli communities. These anti-tank missiles have an estimated range of around 10 kilometers.

Hezbollah says clashing with Israeli troops in Bint Jbeil
Naharnet/April 07/2026
Hezbollah reported "fierce clashes" between its fighters and Israeli soldiers in Bint Jbeil on Tuesday, as Israel said it had completed the deployment of ground troops in south Lebanon. The group said it targeted overnight into Tuesday troops and Merkava tanks in Bint Jbeil and other towns near the border. Hezbollah targeted Akka, Metula, Margaliot, Malikiyya, Misgav Am, Hanita, Shlomi, Yir'on, Even Menachem, Kfar Yuval, Kiryat Shmona, Sa'sa', Karmiel, Netua, Nahariya, Shomera, Kerem Ben Zimra, Safad, Hulata and the Hounin Barracks in northern Israel, as well as troops and Merkava tanks in Rshaf, Beit leef, Taybeh, Ainata, Khiam, Markaba, Maroun al-Ras, Aita al-Shaab, al-Bayyada and Kfarkela in south Lebanon. Israel’s Magen David Adom rescue service said a 20-year-old woman was taken to hospital with a mild head injury from shrapnel in Nahariya. Several cars burst into flames and buildings were damaged from a direct impact on a residential street, medics and Israel’s Fire and Rescue service said.Rocket and drone attacks by Hezbollah had set off sirens throughout Tuesday in Israeli communities close to the Lebanon border. The attacks on Israel and troops in south Lebanon were carried out with rocket salvos and attack drones, Hezbollah said. The group also targeted the Tsnobar logistics base in the occupied Golan Heights and two Israeli helicopters over the southern border town of al-Bayyada with surface-to-air missiles. It later said it intercepted warplanes in south Lebanon and West Bekaa. Meanwhile, Israeli troops detonated houses in Khiam, as they destroyed and burned villages on the border while trying to advance deeper into south Lebanon.

Israel strikes south and east after warning more than 40 towns
Agence France Presse/April 07/2026
The Israeli army struck and bombed overnight into Tuesday several towns and villages in south Lebanon after it issued an evacuation warning for more than 40 southern Lebanese towns.
Strikes and shelling hit Jwaya, Beit Yahoun, Jennata, Jmayjmeh, Hanaway, Majdalzoun, Wadi al-Hujair, Zebdine, Deir al-Zahrani, Maarakeh, Yohmor-Shqif, Arab Salim, Tebnine, al-Hosh, Kfardounin, Betoulay, Sreereh, al-Qatrani, Henniyyeh, al-Qlayleh, Tayr Debba, Sultanieh, Ain Baal, Mayfadoun, Barish, Wadi Sinai, Safad al-Battikh, Shaqra, Burj Qalaway, Tebnine, Baraashit and Haddatha. At least five people were killed in the strikes. Israel also targeted Sohmor in the country's east. In Beirut's southern suburbs, a restive calm prevailed. On Monday, an Israeli airstrike hit Beer al-Abed in Dahieh, with Israel saying it was "striking Hezbollah terror targets in Beirut", after previously warning it would hit the area. Shortly before the warning, an AFP journalist in the southern suburbs had seen just a few shops open, as well as a gas station belonging to the Al-Amana fuel company that was destroyed in a previous raid. The Israeli army had announced targeting Al-Amana stations recently that were "controlled by Hezbollah". Fresh portraits mourning Iran's former supreme leader Ali Khamenei, who was killed in the U.S.-Israeli attacks on February 28 that triggered the war, were also visible along some roads.
The latest attacks came a day after the first reported strike on the town of Ain Saadeh, east of Beirut, which killed three people including Pierre Mouawad, a local official in the Lebanese Forces, a Christian party strongly opposed to Hezbollah, and his wife.
Samir Geagea, head of the Lebanese Forces, said on Monday that "the Israelis were targeting a member of the Quds Force", the Iranian Revolutionary Guards' foreign operations arm, but he did not seem to have been killed. Israel's military said it had struck a "terrorist target" east of Beirut and was reviewing the incident after "reports of casualties among Lebanese civilians not involved in the fighting".In a statement, the Lebanese army said its investigation showed there were "no new tenants" in the targeted building. "While it was discovered that a person was seen leaving the building on a motorcycle immediately after the attack, the investigation is ongoing to determine his identity and uncover further details." Later on Monday, the Israeli military issued the evacuation warning for more than 40 southern Lebanese towns. Hezbollah announced attacks on Israeli targets in south Lebanon and across the border, including launching an advanced missile and attack drones at a base near the central city of Hadera. Lebanon's health ministry said an Israeli attack killed a paramedic from the Hezbollah-allied Risala Scouts association on Monday. It also said two paramedics from the Hezbollah-affiliated Islamic Health Committee were killed in an Israeli strike a day earlier. Lebanon says 1,497 people have been killed since the war erupted, including 57 health workers.World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on X that the WHO "has verified 92 attacks on health facilities, medical vehicles, personnel, and warehouses". "These acts cannot become the new norm," he added. On Sunday, a strike in the capital's Jnah neighborhood hit near the country's largest public medical facility, killing five, the ministry said. Israel's military chief Lieutenant General Eyal Zamir visited troops in southern Lebanon on Sunday and pledged to intensify strikes against Hezbollah. Meanwhile, Lebanon's main border crossing with Syria has remained closed since Israel threatened to strike it two days prior. Ahmad Tamer, head of land and maritime transportation at the Lebanese transport ministry, told AFP that the crossing would be closed "until we receive reassurances that it would not be hit".

Doctors warn that Israel is targeting Lebanon's health care system, as it did in Gaza
Associated Press/April 07/2026
Two years ago, Dr. Mohammed Ziara watched Israel ravage Gaza's health care system, shelling hospitals, striking ambulances and forcing patients to evacuate. Now Ziara — along with many other medical workers, human rights groups and civilians — warns that the same scenario is unfolding in Lebanon. Israel is pushing deep into the southern part of the country in its campaign against Hezbollah. To describe its strategy in this war, the Israeli military has invoked the devastation it wrought in Gaza after the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, attacks. At one point last month, Israeli warplanes even dropped leaflets over Beirut warning that after "great success in Gaza, a new reality is coming to Lebanon, too." "I've lived this before," Ziara, a surgeon from Gaza City who specializes in burns, told The Associated Press on Thursday at a government hospital in the Lebanese port city of Sidon. "I cannot go back to Gaza now," Ziara said. "But I can be here, in Lebanon." As it did with Hamas in Gaza, Israel accuses Hezbollah of hiding in and operating from civilian areas, and using hospitals and ambulances for military purposes. Israel has increasingly targeted Lebanese first responders and medical centers, forcing several hospitals to evacuate. "I was besieged in a hospital," Ziara said of his time at Gaza's Shifa Hospital, where he worked before evacuating to Egypt with his family. He then joined the U.K.-based nonprofit Interburns, which sent him to Lebanon in 2024 to respond to the outbreak of the previous Israel-Hezbollah war. "I feel what these people feel."
An Israeli offensive threatens a health system, again
Since the war between Israel and Hezbollah reignited on March 2, Israeli airstrikes have killed at least 57 health professionals as of Monday, according to the Lebanese Health Ministry.
Israel has carried out more than 160 attacks against emergency medical workers and ambulances, and forced the closure of six hospitals and 49 health clinics through attacks or threats, the ministry reported. In the latest attack that killed two paramedics and seriously wounded a third early Monday, the ministry accused Israel of deliberately targeting a gathering of first responders on duty. Ziara and his team from Interburns, which trains medics around the world in burn care, have helped set up the Lebanese public health system's first specialized burn unit — a critical resource in this crisis-stricken country where the war has killed 1,461 people and wounded 4,430, according to the ministry. Israel claims to have killed hundreds of Hezbollah operatives in the latest bombardment and ground invasion. The Israeli military argues that Hezbollah's use of medical facilities makes them legitimate military targets under international law. It does not offer evidence to support its claims. Hezbollah denies conducting militant activities within civilian sites. Although the group's presence in residential areas is well-documented, there has been no independent verification of its use of hospitals for military purposes. Based in the first city just north of Israel's evacuation zone that covers nearly all southern Lebanon, the Sidon Government Emergency Hospital takes more wounded people every day, said Mona Teryaki, the director. "There's so much demand that we don't have enough nurses."
The rising toll of rescue work
Kamal Fakih, 27, hates when people ask him what happened on March 17. It's not that it pains him to recall the Israeli airstrike. It's that he doesn't remember anything at all. He regained consciousness a day later at the hospital in Sidon, his body burned and cut by shrapnel.
Once stabilized, Fakih tried to connect with the paramedic who pulled him and his friend Hassan from the burning rubble, hoping to hear his account and thank him for saving their lives. But by the time Fakih got his contact, Muhammad Tafili was already dead, killed with a fellow paramedic in an Israeli airstrike on ambulances in the southeastern village of Kfar Tebnit on March 28, according to Lebanon's Health Ministry. That same day, Israeli attacks killed seven other medics across four additional villages, the World Health Organization said. Among the dead was a medic targeted while responding to an Israeli airstrike that killed three journalists working for pro-Hezbollah TV channels. Footage of the incident shows two strikes in quick succession — the first hitting journalists in their car, the second crashing into paramedics as they rushed to the rescue. Israel's military accused the two medics, and two of the three journalists killed, of being Hezbollah operatives. Its claim alarmed watchdogs that witnessed similar justifications for killing more than 260 journalists and 1,700 health workers in Gaza, according to figures from the United Nations humanitarian agency. Although Lebanese medical workers and journalists were killed during the 2024 war with Hezbollah, "this time is different," said Ramzi Kaiss, the Lebanon researcher at Human Rights Watch. He pointed to a startling vow by Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz last week that Israel would flatten all the houses in southern Lebanon to protect its border towns from Hezbollah rockets "in accordance with the model used in Rafah and Beit Hanoun in Gaza" — two cities that Israel almost entirely razed in its offensive against Hamas."There's a new kind of brazenness in declaring an intent to commit unlawful attacks," Kaiss said. "It appears that impunity has emboldened the Israeli military."
Hospitals in the line of fire
Sweeping Israeli evacuation orders in recent weeks have sent over 1 million Lebanese flocking north. As the south came under heavy bombardment, clinics shuttered or suspended operations. Nabih Berri Hospital was swamped by an influx of casualties. To make room, it evacuated dozens of patients. Such transfers involve coordination with the Lebanese army, Health Ministry and U.N. peacekeeping force — a game of telephone, doctors say, that creates potentially life-threatening delays. Admitting patients isn't easy either; the Sidon burn unit must discharge a patient to free up a bed. But the referrals keep coming, straining a health system already crippled by economic collapse. "The health system is on its knees," Ziara said, as the hospital was plunged into darkness until backup generators kicked in 10 minutes later, a result of Lebanon's long-running electricity crisis. "Now front-line hospitals are lacking staff and supplies. They're overwhelmed."
Civilians search for answers
Lebanese civilians say that Israeli bombs often come without warning and hit indiscriminately, feeding a growing feeling that Palestinians in Gaza know well — that nowhere is safe.
Mohammad Qubaisi, 53, said his neighborhood of Zuqaq al-Blat in central Beirut had not received Israeli evacuation guidance before March 18, when Israeli munitions slammed into his seventh-floor apartment. Carrying his wife from the smoldering ruins, he shouted for his sons. His eldest, Adam, called to him. But he couldn't hear Jad. Qubaisi ran back into the skin-searing steam to search for his 15-year-old. When he woke up at the hospital hours later, his face raw with second-degree burns, he knew his son was gone.
The Israeli military said it was targeting Hezbollah. Qubaisi pushed back."These are civilian buildings, not military targets. They hit us and we still don't know why," he said from the Sidon hospital. "We were sleeping safely in our home, and look what happened to us."

US Stops Israel’s Plan to Drag Syria to War on Hezbollah
Tel Aviv: Nazir Magally/Asharq Al Awsat/April 07/2026
Political sources in Tel Aviv revealed that Washington stopped Israel from striking the Masnaa border crossing between Lebanon and Syria, as well as a plan to drag Damascus into the war against Hezbollah. Israel radio said that the American administration stopped Israel from bombing the crossing shortly after Tel Aviv had threatened to attack it over the weekend. Israel had bombed an area close to the crossing, claiming Hezbollah was using it for “military” purposes. Israel radio reported that the US had asked Tel Aviv to refrain from attacking the crossing for “political reasons” and to leave the issue to Syrian security officials who are working on behalf of Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa. It quoted an informed source as saying that the Damascus government had told the Americans that it was working against Hezbollah and that it had thwarted in recent days attempts to smuggle weapons from Syria to Lebanon.
Other sources revealed that Israel wants Syria to become involved in the war against Hezbollah, despite the previous past experience when Israel allowed the Syrian army to enter Lebanon 1976 under the pretext of restoring peace when the country was in civil war. The military intervention led to years of Syrian hegemony over Lebanon, straining relations between Beirut and Damascus. The sources told Israel’s Maariv that Israel is convinced that Lebanon has failed in confronting Hezbollah and American and western powers have lost faith in the Lebanese state. So, Israel has turned to the new Syrian authorities to “handle security responsibilities in Lebanon,” they said. The US believes that the Lebanese government has not met the least of its commitments in disarming Hezbollah, while the army is incapable - or unwilling - to really confront the Iran-backed party, the sources continued. Washington believes that it has no real partner in Lebanon and that no state and military authority has the power to disarm Hezbollah, they added. Observers believe that the only two parties capable of and willing to fight Hezbollah are Israel and the new Syrian authorities led by Sharaa. Israeli sources said Tel Aviv and Damascus have this common goal even if they are not allied with each other. The Syrian authorities view Hezbollah as an enemy, making it a convenient partner in achieving interests in Lebanon. Tel Aviv believes that it can eventually reach understandings with Damascus whereby the Israeli military can control southern Lebanon and Syrian army controls the north and they can both work against Hezbollah. “This appears to be the least of evils amid the current impasse,” said the observers. Tel Aviv is trying to convince Washington of its position, explaining that it would not be waging war against the Lebanese state or imposing hegemony over it. Rather, it would be acting to remove the Hezbollah threat and impose a new reality in Lebanon. Israel wants the US to relay these messages to Syria. Former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger had in the 1970s held indirect talks between late Syrian President Hafez al-Assad's regime and Israel on Damascus sending troops to Lebanon with the aim to break the alliance between Lebanese leftists and the PLO. The regime sent its forces in 1976, but over the years it became obvious that Assad sought to impose Syrian hegemony over Lebanon. In the ensuing years, he acted against Israeli invasions of Lebanon in 1978 and 1982. The current Israeli government is hoping to avoid similar failures in Lebanon by reaching understandings with the current Syrian authorities.

Israeli Threats Shut Masnaa Crossing, Partly Isolate Lebanon from Syria
Beirut: Youssef Diab/Asharq Al-Awsat/April 07/2026
Israel has partially severed Beirut from Damascus after shutting the main border crossings between the two countries, following a warning that it would strike the Masnaa crossing.
The move has disrupted trade and travel, funneling movement through a single crossing in Lebanon’s far northeast, far from both capitals. Syrian and Lebanese diplomatic contacts helped avert an Israeli strike on Masnaa, but failed to reopen it. The crossing remains fully closed. Major General Hassan Choucair, head of Lebanon’s General Security, said protecting personnel and equipment at the crossing was the top priority. He stressed the crossing was legal and could not be used for arms smuggling, noting all trucks and vehicles undergo strict inspections, and dismissed reports of smuggling as false.
Security measures
A Lebanese security source flatly rejected Israeli claims that the crossings are used to smuggle weapons, saying traffic in both directions is subject to strict inspections by Lebanese and Syrian authorities, making any such operations impossible. The source told Asharq Al-Awsat the allegations were baseless and carried political and security motives beyond counter-smuggling. The Israeli escalation over the crossings forms part of broader pressure linked to the war on Lebanon, the source said, and may pave the way for a land blockade along the Lebanese-Syrian border to redraw the rules of engagement with Hezbollah. The source warned the developments could signal a new security reality on the border ahead of any future confrontation.
Undeclared blockade
Border crossings are no longer mere transit points; they have become a focal point where economic strain meets security and political tensions. With movement paralyzed, losses mounting, and tensions rising, Lebanon appears to be entering a phase of compounded pressure, widely seen as an undeclared blockade. MP Sajih Attieh, head of parliament’s public works committee, said conditions at the crossings are steadily deteriorating. Of five crossings with Syria, only one remains effectively open, Jousieh in the Qaa area. He told Asharq Al-Awsat that three crossings in Akkar, Aboudieh, Arida, and Al-Buqiaa remain shut, while efforts to reopen Aboudieh are being hindered by Syrian hesitation due to limited security capacity. Masnaa, the main artery between Lebanon and Syria in the Bekaa Valley, has been paralyzed since Sunday night after the Israeli warning. Activity has shifted to Jousieh, where trucks loaded with goods are backed up on both sides, along with civilian traffic. Attieh said the closures have nearly halted land transit and cross-border trade, hitting key facilities, notably the port of Tripoli, which is losing about $100,000 a day due to the suspension of overland transit goods.
State revenues fall
The closures have also choked Lebanese exports, especially fruit, vegetables and local industries, which have lost their main overland route to Arab markets, adding pressure on productive sectors. Attieh said the impact extends beyond exports. Maritime imports have dropped by up to 70%, affected by the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, triggering a sharp fall in state revenues. Monthly revenues from customs, imports and value-added tax have fallen from about $450 million to roughly $125 million, he said, adding that the government has frozen implementation of the 2026 budget. Public spending had been set based on revenues nearing $6 billion, making the freeze unavoidable amid a roughly 70% drop in imports, he said, warning that the risk of a deeper economic crisis will become clearer once the war ends.

'We just want to stay home': A Lebanese village under Israeli occupation
Nabih Bulos/Los Angeles Times/April 7, 2026
That’s when the Israeli troops stationed a few hundred yards down the road come into this mountain village less than a mile from Lebanon’s border with Israel, searching houses and detaining residents at will. “When it gets dark, the horror starts,” said Walid Nasser, a retired police officer and a municipal board member. He got up and pointed out the window to somewhere hidden in the gray clouds wreathing the mountains overlooking Kfar Chouba. “If there wasn't fog, you’d see the Israelis up there," he said. "They're watching us all the time. … You keep thinking, ‘Now they’ll knock on the door, now they’ll barge into the house.’”Hussein Abdul-Aal has similar fears. His house on Kfar Chouba’s eastern edge was one of the closest to the Israelis’ position. In recent days, Abdul-Aal said, they searched the three houses near him, prompting their owners to leave. The last residents still in the neighborhood are Abdul-Aal, his wife, their two cats and the abandoned dogs they feed.
“It’s my dream now to surrender fully to sleep, to be relaxed and sleep calmly at night,” Abdul-Aal said. This is life now in Kfar Chouba since fighting between the Lebanese Shiite militant group Hezbollah and Israel escalated last month, triggered by the U.S. and Israeli war on Iran.
Abdul-Aal, a 72-year-old retired high school sociology teacher with an avuncular smile, likened residents’ behavior around Israeli troops to a lazy student hoping they’re not called on in class. “You try to make yourself small, to avoid your teacher’s gaze. We do the same — staying indoors, keeping away from the windows, so the Israelis don’t come to us,” he said. “The night they came in to our neighborhood, we held our breath for three hours and didn’t move,” said Afaf Awadhah, Abdul-Aal’s wife. Every day, the soundtrack of a war no one here wanted — the bass rumble of warplanes, the snare drum of machine guns — grows louder. Israeli military leaders repeatedly vow to invade all of south Lebanon (an area slightly smaller than Los Angeles) and to expel hundreds of thousands of Shiite residents they consider Hezbollah supporters and occupy what they call a “defensive buffer zone.”
Though much of southern Lebanon is predominantly Shiite, Kfar Chouba and its neighbors comprise a pocket of Christian, Druze and Sunni Muslim communities. These residents insist they are neutral and refuse to leave, even as the fighting threatens to engulf their towns and villages. In recent weeks, Israeli military officials contacted area mayors, telling them they could remain in the buffer zone on the condition they didn’t let displaced Shiites stay in their villages, or allow them to be used as staging grounds for Hezbollah attacks. “They called me from the Israeli Defense Ministry on Wednesday, and told me that if we didn’t keep Hezbollah and the displaced out, they would order us to leave and raze the village,” said Qassem Al-Qadri, Kfar Chouba’s mayor. Like others, he felt he had little choice but to acquiesce. Yet that neutrality has not spared Kfar Chouba and neighboring villages from attack.
In the first weeks of the war, Israeli bombardment killed three people — a police officer and two shepherds. During one of their midnight incursions in the village, residents said, Israeli soldiers broke into the houses of three residents, interrogated them and detained one of them overnight in their outpost before letting him go. A few days later, the mayor said, another incursion into the nearby village of Halta saw them shoot and kill 15-year-old Mohammad Abdul-Aal (a distant relation of Hussein's) when he walked out of his house to check on the noise.
Residents say the Israelis have prevented residents — most of whom work in agriculture — from accessing their farmland near the border; other fields were bombed with white phosphorous, Lebanese authorities said, destroying vegetation and thousands of trees.
“All of us here, we’re just waiting: Waiting for when the Israelis will come and kill us, waiting to see where they hit, or where they’re entering,” Al-Qadri said.
He added that the Lebanese army withdrew from its position above the village at the beginning of the war, despite entreaties by residents for it to remain.
“We even offered the army soldiers places to stay in the village and provide food for them, but they were ordered to leave," he said. "We need the Lebanese state here.” War returned to Kfar Chouba and Lebanon on March 2, after Hezbollah lobbed rockets and drones on Israel in response to its killing of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and near-constant attacks despite a ceasefire that ended their last conflict in 2024. The aftereffects of that earlier fight can still be seen in Kfar Chouba in the bomb-eviscerated houses and mosque. And when a trail of dust rises from a road, resident say, it's another Israeli tank moving through. So far, more than 1,300 people have been killed in Lebanon, with more than 1 million people displaced, the Lebanese government says. Israel’s plans for a buffer zone have prompted fears of a longer displacement that would essentially amount to an ethnic cleansing of Lebanon’s south. One cold morning in Kfar Chouba, Al-Qadri, Nasser and a few others who remained met in the village’s main municipal building. It was a relatively quiet moment, a sharp contrast from the day before, when F-16 warplanes pierced the clouds above as they went on bombing sorties over south Lebanon.
Sitting around a wood stove and drinking cups of coffee and tea, the residents reflected on the upheavals that had become a regular feature of their lives.
Al-Qadri, 81, had seen the bucolic mountains here turn into a battlefield since Israel’s creation in 1948. After Syria’s loss of the Golan Heights in 1967, Israel chomped off bits of Lebanese and Syrian territory, cutting off lands where Kfar Chouba residents would grow wheat and olives.
In 1969, Palestinian fighters used the area here — with Lebanon’s blessing — to wage attacks on Israel, prompting Israeli soldiers to dynamite 17 houses in Kfar Chouba. The village was almost destroyed during Lebanon’s hugely destructive war in 1975, when south Lebanon was taken over by an Israeli-backed militia, which tried to forcibly recruit Kfar Chouba residents into its ranks. “I refused, and they put me for a year in jail. I left after that,” Nasser said. Residents rebuilt their homes, but then Israel’s occupation in 1982 — which triggered Hezbollah’s rise — forced them to leave yet again until Hezbollah ousted Israel in 2000. Only then did people such as Abdul-Aal and Nasser return. Later confrontations with Hezbollah in 2006 saw Kfar Chouba completely destroyed. Villagers rebuilt. But more war in 2023 killed 27 people here, and three-quarters of the village fled.
“I’ve spent more than half my life forced out of my home,” Abdul-Aal said. Now a little more than 500 people remain, a fraction of the 2,000 who were here before 2023. The young no longer stay, seeking opportunities in Beirut or out of Lebanon. Many houses have the neglected look of infrequent habitation.
“We had big dreams back in the day to liberate Palestine, and we were willing to help,” Al-Qadri said, adding that in the past there were a number of Hezbollah positions in the mountains around Kfar Chouba. “Then our dreams became humbler, to liberate our own lands. Now it's even less. We don't want to liberate anything. We just want to stay home and not leave our homes,” he said. Like elsewhere in Lebanon these days, the conversation inevitably veered toward Israel’s plan for a new long-term occupation of south Lebanon. Nazih Yahya, a septuagenarian resident with the wearied tone of someone long accustomed to conflict, expected the Israeli military to treat residents in non-Shiite villages differently from areas it counts as bastions of Hezbollah support. “We have two models, Gaza and the West Bank,” he said. In Gaza, he explained, the Israeli military razed cities and prevented residents’ return; in the West Bank, the pace of destruction was less, with Palestinians still in place but under constant threat of attack. “What they did to Gaza they’ll do to most of south Lebanon," he said. Kfar Chouba, will "be like the West Bank.”For Abdul-Aal, the only form of resistance still open to him was to stay in his home, no matter what. “What is nationalism? Is it a political idea? Or is it a house, a land, a memory of a place?” he asked. “No matter who comes and rules this place, so as long as we stay here, they can’t take being Lebanese from me.” Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week.
This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.

Israeli goals in Lebanon war shift from imminently disarming Hezbollah to reestablishing South Lebanon Security Zone
David Daoud/FDD's Long War Journal/April 07/2026
The renewed Lebanon war between Israel and Hezbollah that began on March 2 is now over a month old, with little change in the overall picture or disposition of the main actors. However, Israeli officials have reframed initial publicly stated goals for the conflict away from an imminent disarmament of Hezbollah, signaling a more prolonged approach. Simultaneously, political disagreements over the conflict and Hezbollah’s status have arisen in Lebanon while Hezbollah has escalated its attacks against Israel and rhetoric.
The Israeli military continues to control the tempo of the fighting. Israeli operations against Hezbollah remain more intense and expansive than the September to November 2024 phase of the war, but have noticeably transitioned from an initially ferocious retaliatory campaign to a sustained war of attrition. Israeli war aims remain the same. However, the apparent means of achieving them have crystallized into narrower objectives of establishing a security zone in southern Lebanon and continuing to attack Hezbollah’s assets and personnel, while pressing the Lebanese government to disarm the group.
Lebanon, meanwhile, remains unable to implement any of the decisions it has taken against Hezbollah or its Iranian patron, including a March 2 ban on Hezbollah’s military activities and a directive to the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) to disarm the group. Hezbollah continues to fight in defiance of Beirut’s orders. Amidst this impasse, the international community, including the United States, has shown little practical interest in ending the conflict in Lebanon.
Israel shifts its immediate war goals but remains committed to Hezbollah’s disarmament
Israel’s overall objective during this phase of the Lebanon war remains achieving Hezbollah’s disarmament. At face value, this appears more expansive than the Israeli goal from October 8, 2023, until the ceasefire that went into effect on November 27, 2024. Then, Israel merely wanted Hezbollah to end its attacks in support of Gaza and withdraw from the Southern Litani Area, which would allow northern Israeli residents to return home without the threat of rocket fire.
Israel Defense Forces (IDF) Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir articulated this goal at the outset of the renewed fighting, saying Israel “would not relent from disarming Hezbollah.” Several senior Israeli officials echoed the sentiment since then. However, Zamir later clarified that he envisioned achieving this aim through a prolonged process. Perhaps reflecting this assessment, on April 3, the IDF reframed its objectives more narrowly, saying militarily disarming Hezbollah was unrealistic because such an endeavor would require occupying all of Lebanon, which surpasses Israel’s means.
Hezbollah’s political and operational nerve center sits in Beirut’s southern suburbs, and it maintains military assets and training sites from the town of Beqaa up to the town of Hermel. The IDF lacks the manpower to invade these strongholds and hold them until Hezbollah is disarmed. The Israeli military’s roughly 635,000 active and reserve personnel include a far smaller combat force. Israel would have to occupy hostile, unpacified terrain over extended lines while simultaneously pushing north through south Lebanon, up the coast toward Dahiyeh, and along Lebanon’s northeastern border with Syria—all while remaining undermanned and overcommitted across other vital active fronts, and prepared for additional theaters to ignite. Airpower alone cannot disarm Hezbollah. Israel’s sustained aerial campaign over the past 15 months hindered, but didn’t halt, Hezbollah’s comprehensive regeneration.
The IDF is instead planning to soon present the Israeli government with a proposal to establish a “security zone” in south Lebanon about 2–3 kilometers from the Blue Line, Israel’s de facto frontier line with Lebanon. Per the plan, no Israeli outposts will be built in the area. Lebanese civilians would be evacuated from the zone to prevent friction between the locals and IDF troops.
The campaign, however, is expected to persist—even past a ceasefire with Iran—during which the IDF aims to ensure Hezbollah operatives do not return to locales within the security zone. In fact, as far as can be told from open source materials, the IDF has already begun pushing into south Lebanon to establish this zone, in some cases seizing the second line of Lebanese frontier villages approximately 6 kilometers from the border. Israeli officials have repeatedly spoken about establishing such a buffer zone in southern Lebanon. It remains unclear, however, whether the IDF still intends to reach the Litani River along both the southern Lebanese coast and the interior before falling back to this smaller strip of territory. The political echelon, meanwhile, remains committed to achieving the maximalist goal—but, ultimately, through Lebanese efforts. Politically, Israel still wants a Lebanon where Hezbollah is disarmed or at least is no longer a cross-border threat, and continues to call on Beirut to move toward such an outcome.
Lebanon struggles to assert its sovereignty
Domestic disunity continues to hamper Lebanese efforts to implement the government’s decisions to disarm Hezbollah and other attempts to assert sovereignty. Domestic fractures are, according to a recent Reuters report, nearing breaking points along sectarian and political lines. Displaced Shiites have encountered hostility from other Lebanese, with local authorities vetting the arrivals for links to Hezbollah and the presence of the group’s operatives, for fear they may attract Israeli targeting. On March 24, Lebanese Foreign Minister Youssef Raggi declared Iran’s ambassador-designate to Lebanon, Mohammad Reza Shibani, persona non grata and ordered his departure from Lebanon by March 29. The move was symbolic, as the ministry said it would not impact Beirut’s relations with Tehran, and Shibani had yet to formally assume his ambassadorial role. Nevertheless, Iran has refused to comply, with assistance from influential Lebanese actors—namely, Hezbollah and the Amal Movement. Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, who is also the leader of Amal, opposed the decision and asked Shibani to remain in Lebanon. The two parties have also created a narrative casting doubt on the legitimacy of the move, characterizing it, despite contrary reports, as a politically motivated personal move by Raggi that was not coordinated with the Lebanese president or Council of Ministers. Shiite opposition to Raggi’s decision regarding Shibani has also included Minister for Administrative Reform Fadi Makki, an ostensible political independent and an appointee of Prime Minister Nawaf Salam. Makki, unlike his Amal and Hezbollah counterparts, has continued to attend cabinet sessions, despite Berri’s requests. However, he has nevertheless expressed his opposition to the decision—echoing the Amal/Hezbollah line that it is unnecessarily divisive at a time of existential crisis.
As of April 2, 1,345 Lebanese have been killed and over 4,000 have been injured during the renewed conflict. An estimated 1.2 million have been displaced. Neither the Lebanese Health Ministry nor Hezbollah has provided an official count of the group’s fallen fighters. However, the IDF claimed to have killed 700 Hezbollah operatives so far, while unnamed sources “familiar with Hezbollah’s count” told Reuters the group’s casualties stood at 400.
Hezbollah continues fighting
Hezbollah remains defiant on the battlefield and in the political sphere.
The group continues to launch attacks into Israel that have escalated in volume. By March 31, Reuters reported that Hezbollah had launched 5,000 projectiles at Israel since the conflict restarted—attacks that have also become more deadly. At least eight Israeli soldiers have been killed in the renewed war so far, with five severely injured and three lightly injured on April 3. On March 24, a Hezbollah rocket attack near Mahanaim Junction in northern Israel killed a 27-year-old woman. A March 26 Hezbollah rocket attack on Nahariya in northern Israel killed one man and wounded 14 people.
At least four waves of attacks have been coordinated with attacks by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) against Israel, per IRGC claims. Additionally, on April 3, IDF troops discovered a cache of Hezbollah first-person view (FPV) drones. Hezbollah’s use of these weapons would make its battlefield threat cheaper, more precise, and harder to suppress/intercept than rockets, especially against armor and exposed troop positions. The discovery dovetails with reports that the group’s regeneration efforts during the ceasefire focused on drone procurement and production, precisely because of these factors. Hezbollah has shown no intention of halting its attacks. In his most recent statements, Hezbollah Secretary-General Naim Qassem continued to frame the group’s decision to attack Israel as an act of self-defense on behalf of Lebanon. He also insisted that diplomacy has failed, and Israel and the United States pose an existential threat to Lebanon. Qassem argued that, therefore, only resistance—not disarmament or concessions—can protect the country.
Hezbollah also continues to reject the government’s March 2 decision proscribing the group’s military activities. Wafic Safa, Hezbollah’s former liaison official with Lebanese security agencies, and who the latest reports indicate is the assistant chairman of Hezbollah’s Political Council, called the decision a “grave mistake.”Safa insisted that Hezbollah would never be disarmed, “not during the battle, not before it, not after it,” and said that in the post-war phase, the group would prioritize the government’s reversal of its March 2 decision. “This government will recant,” he said, “just as Fouad Siniora’s government before,” an implicit reference to Hezbollah’s use of force on May 7, 2008, in response to Beirut’s decision to dismantle the group’s telecommunications system. Safa also said that Hezbollah “may have to regain its prestige by force,” suggesting the group could engage in possible coercion against the Lebanese state or its opponents if anti-Hezbollah decisions are not reversed.
Global resignation over the Lebanon conflict
The international community has not offered any new off-ramps from the conflict in recent weeks. The French diplomatic track remains theoretically active, but only passively. Meanwhile, the United States has continued to decline to act as a mediator between Jerusalem and Beirut. Some reports suggested Washington’s new approach may be to bypass the Lebanese entirely, with one report indicating the US had encouraged Syria to consider helping disarm Hezbollah in eastern Lebanon. US Ambassador to the Republic of Turkey and Special Envoy for Syria Tom Barrack later denied this report.
**David Daoud is Senior Fellow at at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies where he focuses on Israel, Hezbollah, and Lebanon affairs.
https://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2026/04/analysis-israeli-goals-in-lebanon-war-shift-from-imminently-disarming-hezbollah-to-reestablishing-south-lebanon-security-zone.php
Read in FDD's Long War Journal

Links to several important news websites
National News Agency (Lebanon)
https://www.nna-leb.gov.lb/ar
Nidaa Al Watan
https://www.nidaalwatan.com/
MTV Lebanon
https://www.mtv.com.lb/
Voice of Lebanon
https://www.vdl.me/
Asas Media
https://asasmedia.com/
Naharnet
https://www.naharnet.com/
Al Markazia News Agency
https://almarkazia.com/ar
LBCI (English)
https://www.lbcgroup.tv/news/en
LBCI (Arabic)
https://www.lbcgroup.tv/news/ar
Janoubia Website
https://www.lbcgroup.tv/news/ar
Kataeb Party Official Website
https://www.kataeb.org

The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on April 07-08/2026
US and Iran agree to 2-week ceasefire as Trump seizes diplomatic offramp
Bassem Mroue, Jon Gambrell And Samy Magdy/April 7, 2026
TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — U.S. President Donald Trump pulled back on his threats to launch devastating strikes on Iran late Tuesday, swerving to deescalate the war less than two hours before the deadline he set for Tehran to capitulate or face a major escalation.
Trump said he was holding off on his threatened attacks on Iranian bridges, power plants and other civilian targets as the U.S. and Iran agreed to a two-week ceasefire that includes the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz. He said Iran has proposed a “workable” 10-point peace plan that could help end the war launched by the U.S. and Israel in February. Iran’s Supreme National Security Council said it has accepted the ceasefire and that it would negotiate with the United States in Islamabad beginning Friday. Neither Iran nor the United States said when the ceasefire would begin.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said passage through the strait would be allowed under Iranian military management. It wasn’t immediately clear whether that meant Iran would loosen its chokehold on the waterway. The plan includes allowing both Iran and Oman to charge fees on ships transiting through the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow mouth of the Persian Gulf, a regional official said Wednesday. The official said Iran would use the money it raised for reconstruction. In addition to control of the strait, Iran’s demands for ending the war include withdrawal of U.S. combat forces from the region, the lifting of sanctions and the release of its frozen assets. Even as the ceasefire was announced, missile alerts continued in the United Arab Emirates, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Kuwait early Wednesday, hinting at the chaos surrounding the diplomatic moves. A gas processing facility in Abu Dhabi was ablaze after incoming Iranian fire, officials said.The U.S. military has halted all offensive operations against Iran but continues defensive actions, said an official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to describe sensitive military operations. Since the war began, Trump has repeatedly backed off deadlines just before they expire. In doing so again Tuesday, Trump said in a social media post he had come to the decision “based on conversations” with Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Gen. Asim Munir, Pakistan’s powerful army chief. Sharif, in a post on X hours earlier, urged Trump to extend his deadline by two weeks to allow diplomacy to advance. He used the same post to ask Iran to open the strait for two weeks. “Almost all of the various points of past contention have been agreed to between the United States and Iran, but a two week period will allow the Agreement to be finalized and consummated,” Trump said.
Israel has also agreed to the ceasefire, according to a White House official who was not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity. And Sharif said the ceasefire extends to Israel and Hezbollah halting fighting in Lebanon. But there are concerns in Israel about the agreement, according to a person familiar with the situation who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not allowed to speak to the media. The person said Israel would like to achieve more. Iran’s stockpile of highly enriched uranium is still buried at enrichment sites. The program had been one of the main issues cited by both Israel and the U.S. in launching the war.
Trump’s expansive threat Tuesday did not seem to account for potential harm to civilians, prompting Democrats in Congress, some United Nations officials and scholars in military law to say such strikes would violate international law. Tehran’s representative at the U.N., Amir-Saeid Iravani, said the threats “constitute incitement to war crimes and potentially genocide” and that Iran would "take immediate and proportionate reciprocal measures” if Trump launches devastating strikes. The U.S. and Israel have battered Iran with attacks targeting its military capabilities, leadership and nuclear program. Iran has responded with a stream of strikes on Israel and Gulf Arab neighbors, causing regional chaos and outsized economic and political shock. Late Tuesday, Pakistan's prime minister urged Trump to extend his deadline by two weeks to allow diplomacy to advance. In a post on X, Shehbaz Sharif, whose country has been leading negotiations, also asked Iran to open up for two weeks the Strait of Hormuz. Before the deadline, airstrikes hit two bridges and a train station, and the U.S. hit military infrastructure on Kharg Island, a key hub for Iranian oil production.
While Iran cannot match the sophistication of U.S. and Israeli weaponry or their dominance in the air, its chokehold on the strait since the war began in late February is roiling the world economy and raising the pressure on Trump both at home and abroad to find a way out of the standoff.
Trump keeps an off-ramp open
“A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again,” if a deal isn’t reached, Trump said in an online post Tuesday morning. But he also seemed to keep open the possibility of an off-ramp, saying that “maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen.”Earlier, Iranian official Alireza Rahimi issued a video message calling on “all young people, athletes, artists, students and university students and their professors” to form human chains around power plants. Iranians have formed human chains in the past around nuclear sites at times of heightened tensions with the West. State media posted videos online that showed hundreds of flag-waving people massed at two bridges and at a power plant hundreds of kilometers (miles) from Tehran, though it was not clear how widespread the practice was.
“They’re not allowed to do that,” Trump said in a phone call with NBC News. A general in Iran's Revolutionary Guard general warned that Iran would “deprive the U.S. and its allies of the region’s oil and gas for years” and expand its attacks across the Gulf region if Trump carries out his threat. In Tehran, the mood was bleak. A young teacher said that many opponents of Iran's Islamic system had hoped Trump's attacks would quickly topple it. As the war drags on, she fears U.S. and Israeli strikes will spread chaos. “If we don’t have the internet, and if we don’t have electricity, water, and gas, we’re really going back to the Stone Age, as Trump said,” she told The Associated Press, speaking on the condition of anonymity for her safety.
Airstrikes hit Iran, which fires on Saudi Arabia and Israel
Intense airstrikes pounded Tehran, including in residential neighborhoods. In the past, such strikes have targeted Iranian government and security officials. The Israeli military said it attacked an Iranian petrochemical site in Shiraz, the second day in a row it hit such a facility. The military later said it also struck bridges in several cities that were being used by Iranian forces to transport weapons and military equipment. A U.S. official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military operations, described the strikes on Kharg Island as hitting targets previously struck and not directed at oil infrastructure.
Saudi Arabia said it intercepted seven ballistic missiles and four drones launched by Iran. Iran also fired on Israel. More than 1,900 people have been killed in Iran since the war began, but the government has not updated the toll for days. In Lebanon, where Israel is fighting Iran-backed Hezbollah militants, more than 1,500 people have been killed. and more than 1 million people have been displaced. Eleven Israeli soldiers have died there. In Gulf Arab states and the occupied West Bank, more than two dozen people have died, while 23 have been reported dead in Israel, and 13 U.S. service members have been killed.

Trump says he has agreed to two-week ceasefire with Iran
Reuters/08 April ,2026
US President Donald Trump said on Tuesday that he had agreed to a two-week ceasefire with Iran, less than two hours before his deadline for Tehran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz or face widespread attacks on its civilian infrastructure. The announcement on social media was the latest example of Trump backing down from severe threats, after he warned Iran earlier on Tuesday that “a whole civilization will die tonight” if his demands were not met. Trump said the deal was subject to Iran's agreement to pause its blockade of oil and gas supplies through the strait, which typically handles about one-fifth of global oil shipments.“This will be a double sided CEASEFIRE!” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform. “The reason for doing so is that we have already met and exceeded all Military objectives, and are very far along with a definitive Agreement concerning Longterm PEACE with Iran, and PEACE in the Middle East.”Trump said Iran had presented a 10-point proposal that was a “workable basis” for negotiations and that he expected an agreement to be “finalized and consummated” during the two-week ceasefire.

Iran Signals Long Multi-Front War as Trump Deadline Nears
Bloomberg/April 07/2026
Iran Signals Long Multi-Front War as Trump Deadline Nears
(Bloomberg) -- As US President Donald Trump’s latest ultimatum to Iran to agree to a ceasefire deal approaches, hardliners now in charge in Tehran are relishing the idea of escalation and a region-wide conflict. The US and Israel have taken out layers of senior commanders of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps over the course of the nearly six-week war, but those who remain are girding for a protracted battle, with little fear of Trump’s threats to destroy civilian infrastructure. This could spark an upsurge in fighting that would further engulf Middle Eastern countries and exacerbate what has become a global energy crisis.An Iraqi militia tied to the IRGC warned on its Telegram channel Tuesday that if Trump acts on his threat to broadly obliterate Iran, then it would target the Red Sea port of Yanbu to “plunge the world into an energy war.” Saudi Arabia has been using the Yanbu terminal to export almost 5 million barrels of oil a day to get around Iran’s blockade of the strategic Strait of Hormuz. “The group of people who are institutionally and personally invested in the resilience and survivability of the regime are now in command and control,” said Sanam Vakil, director of the Middle East and North Africa program at London-based Chatham House. “They are going to be hard to convince that the time to deal is now and that’s why the terms and conditions that Iran keeps putting on the table are so maximalist.”Iran’s demands include guarantees it won’t be attacked again by the US and Israel, the right to control Hormuz and the lifting of longstanding economic sanctions. Trump wants Tehran to reopen the strait, give up its nuclear program, end its support for proxy militant groups and accept restrictions on its missile program. On Tuesday, he said Iran’s “whole civilization will die” if a deal isn’t reached. Vakil said the dominant hardline faction in Iran doesn’t want to concede too early, while the weaker reformist group is “looking to find an off ramp” because it believes Tehran has significant leverage now with its control of Hormuz.It’s increasingly clear that Iranian leaders like President Masoud Pezeshkian and Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, who might be more open to a deal with Trump, don’t have a full grasp of what’s going on militarily, said a European official whose government remains in contact with them, and requested anonymity in order to speak freely. Trump’s threats to destroy civilian infrastructure including water and power facilities — potential war crimes under international law — aren’t likely to sway the regime, Karim Sadjadpour, senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment, said in a series of posts on X on Monday.
“His threats to decimate Iran have not moved a regime which, since its inception, has shown itself willing to destroy the country and its people rather than compromise its power or ideology,” he wrote.The idea that Iran is ready for a long war no matter the cost has dominated the messaging in recent days from both inside Iran and its proxies in Iraq and Lebanon. “Hormuz won’t be accessible to the enemies and let them know that if they want to do it by force then there won’t be oil and gas terminals left,” Abu Hussein Al-Hamidawi, commander of the IRGC-backed Ktaib Hezbollah militia in Iraq, said in a statement on Monday. Naim Qasem, the leader of Hezbollah in Lebanon, told the Lebanese people to prepare for a protracted battle and more sacrifices. A social media message circulated by Iranian state media last week and attributed to Esmail Qaani, who commands the IRGC unit known as the Quds Force, said “get used to the new regional order.” He spoke of a “unified command center” with the proxies including Yemen’s Houthis. “For Iran’s hardliners, the longer they draw out the war, the worse the Americans will look,” said Matthew Levitt, an expert on Iran and its proxies and director of the counter-terrorism program at the Washington Institute think tank.Iran is also increasingly telling Gulf states that their US security alliances and hosting of American bases are liabilities.“The bases that the enemy has set up in your countries are not only being used to attack us, but they are also hotbeds for sowing discord and division among Muslim nations,” Mohammad Reza Mavalizadeh, governor of Iran’s southwestern Khuzestan province, said on Iranian state TV on Sunday, addressing Gulf Arab leaders. But that strategy shows signs of backfiring already. In wealthy Gulf states, despite their frustrations with the war, Iran’s aggression is drawing them closer to the US, and even Israel in the case of the United Arab Emirates. “Our main security partner is the United States — we will double down on our relationship,” Anwar Gargash, diplomatic adviser to the UAE’s President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed, told reporters on Saturday.
--With assistance from Samy Adghirni.
©2026 Bloomberg L.P.

Trump weighs plea for Iran deadline extension
AFP/07 April ,2026
US President Donald Trump was looking at a request on Tuesday from mediator Pakistan to extend his Iran attacks deadline by two weeks - hours after warning that “a whole civilization will die” if Tehran fails to make a deal. But as the clock ticked towards Trump’s 8:00 PM (midnight GMT) deadline, Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif appeared to offer an off-ramp.“To allow diplomacy to run its course, I earnestly request President Trump to extend the deadline for two weeks,” Sharif said on X, saying that efforts to resolve the crisis were moving “steadily, strongly and powerfully.”Sharif said he had also asked Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz shipping channel for the same two-week period. The White House said Trump - who has threatened massive attacks against Iran’s power plants and bridges to take the country back into the “Stone Age” - was looking at the Pakistani request.“The President has been made been aware of the proposal, and a response will come,” Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told AFP in a statement. Trump, who has previously pushed back the deadline on a number of occasions, separately told Fox News that the United States was in “heated negotiations” but declined to say how they were going. Since February 28 the United States and its ally Israel have leveled Iranian military targets, killed the country’s top leadership and devastated parts of its infrastructure. Early Tuesday Trump issued one of his most glaring threats of the war.“A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don’t want that to happen, but it probably will,” he wrote on his Truth Social platform.Vice President JD Vance offered his own threatening assessment of what may follow, warning Tehran that US forces have tools they “so far haven’t decided to use” against the Islamic Republic. Iran has rejected US pressure, with state media reporting authorities are insisting that instead of a ceasefire it wants a full end to the war.

Iran Signals Long Multi-Front War as Trump Deadline Nears
Bloomberg/April 07/2026
Iran Signals Long Multi-Front War as Trump Deadline Nears
(Bloomberg) -- As US President Donald Trump’s latest ultimatum to Iran to agree to a ceasefire deal approaches, hardliners now in charge in Tehran are relishing the idea of escalation and a region-wide conflict. The US and Israel have taken out layers of senior commanders of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps over the course of the nearly six-week war, but those who remain are girding for a protracted battle, with little fear of Trump’s threats to destroy civilian infrastructure. This could spark an upsurge in fighting that would further engulf Middle Eastern countries and exacerbate what has become a global energy crisis. An Iraqi militia tied to the IRGC warned on its Telegram channel Tuesday that if Trump acts on his threat to broadly obliterate Iran, then it would target the Red Sea port of Yanbu to “plunge the world into an energy war.” Saudi Arabia has been using the Yanbu terminal to export almost 5 million barrels of oil a day to get around Iran’s blockade of the strategic Strait of Hormuz. “The group of people who are institutionally and personally invested in the resilience and survivability of the regime are now in command and control,” said Sanam Vakil, director of the Middle East and North Africa program at London-based Chatham House. “They are going to be hard to convince that the time to deal is now and that’s why the terms and conditions that Iran keeps putting on the table are so maximalist.” Iran’s demands include guarantees it won’t be attacked again by the US and Israel, the right to control Hormuz and the lifting of longstanding economic sanctions. Trump wants Tehran to reopen the strait, give up its nuclear program, end its support for proxy militant groups and accept restrictions on its missile program. On Tuesday, he said Iran’s “whole civilization will die” if a deal isn’t reached. Vakil said the dominant hardline faction in Iran doesn’t want to concede too early, while the weaker reformist group is “looking to find an off ramp” because it believes Tehran has significant leverage now with its control of Hormuz. It’s increasingly clear that Iranian leaders like President Masoud Pezeshkian and Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, who might be more open to a deal with Trump, don’t have a full grasp of what’s going on militarily, said a European official whose government remains in contact with them, and requested anonymity in order to speak freely.
Trump’s threats to destroy civilian infrastructure including water and power facilities — potential war crimes under international law — aren’t likely to sway the regime, Karim Sadjadpour, senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment, said in a series of posts on X on Monday. “His threats to decimate Iran have not moved a regime which, since its inception, has shown itself willing to destroy the country and its people rather than compromise its power or ideology,” he wrote.The idea that Iran is ready for a long war no matter the cost has dominated the messaging in recent days from both inside Iran and its proxies in Iraq and Lebanon. “Hormuz won’t be accessible to the enemies and let them know that if they want to do it by force then there won’t be oil and gas terminals left,” Abu Hussein Al-Hamidawi, commander of the IRGC-backed Ktaib Hezbollah militia in Iraq, said in a statement on Monday. Naim Qasem, the leader of Hezbollah in Lebanon, told the Lebanese people to prepare for a protracted battle and more sacrifices. A social media message circulated by Iranian state media last week and attributed to Esmail Qaani, who commands the IRGC unit known as the Quds Force, said “get used to the new regional order.” He spoke of a “unified command center” with the proxies including Yemen’s Houthis. “For Iran’s hardliners, the longer they draw out the war, the worse the Americans will look,” said Matthew Levitt, an expert on Iran and its proxies and director of the counter-terrorism program at the Washington Institute think tank. Iran is also increasingly telling Gulf states that their US security alliances and hosting of American bases are liabilities.“The bases that the enemy has set up in your countries are not only being used to attack us, but they are also hotbeds for sowing discord and division among Muslim nations,” Mohammad Reza Mavalizadeh, governor of Iran’s southwestern Khuzestan province, said on Iranian state TV on Sunday, addressing Gulf Arab leaders. But that strategy shows signs of backfiring already. In wealthy Gulf states, despite their frustrations with the war, Iran’s aggression is drawing them closer to the US, and even Israel in the case of the United Arab Emirates. “Our main security partner is the United States — we will double down on our relationship,” Anwar Gargash, diplomatic adviser to the UAE’s President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed, told reporters on Saturday.

US has struck Iranian military targets on Kharg Island. Here’s what we know about it
Billy Stockwell, CNN/April 7, 2026
The US said it struck military targets on the key Iranian oil export hub of Kharg Island, although the strikes did not target oil facilities, according to one US official. Vice President JD Vance acknowledged the recent US strikes on Kharg Island but said they did not mark “a change in strategy” ahead of President Donald Trump’s 8 p.m. ET Tuesday night deadline for Iran to open the Strait of Hormuz. Iranian damage assessments following the strikes found most of the oil transport hub’s infrastructure intact, according to a report from Iranian state-affiliated media, citing local sources. Iran’s semi-official Mehr News Agency reported that maritime infrastructure on the island, which handles around 90% of Iran’s oil exports, suffered little damage during US bombing and continues to operate as normal. The US had previously struck Kharg Island in March. US Central Command said at the time that 90 targets had been hit, including “naval mine storage facilities, missile storage bunkers, and multiple other military sites.”Kharg Island, a coral outcrop off Iran’s coast, has been an economic lifeline for Tehran that handles roughly 90% of the country’s crude oil exports.
Here’s what we know about the island:
What is Kharg Island?
Kharg Island is a five-mile stretch of land off the Iranian coast around a third of the size of Manhattan, described by US officials as the “nexus for all the Iranian oil supply.”Its long jetties jutt into waters that are deep enough to accommodate oil supertankers, making the island a critical site for oil distribution. The island has long been key to Iran’s economy. A declassified CIA document from 1984 published online said the facilities are “the most vital in Iran’s oil system, and their continued operation is essential to Iran’s economic well-being.”Alternative export routes that bypass the Strait of Hormuz exist, but they are limited and have not been robustly tested on a large scale, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA). For example, in 2021, Iran inaugurated the Jask oil terminal, allowing crude oil to be transported to Jask on the Gulf of Oman just east of the strait, but the terminal is not considered a viable export option for Iranian crude, the IEA said. Storage capacity on Kharg is estimated at roughly 30 million barrels and, according to trade intelligence firm Kpler, about 18 million barrels of crude are currently stored there, Reuters reported. Last month, Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid said destroying the terminal would “cripple Iran’s economy and topple the regime.” He declared that Israel “must destroy all of Iran’s oil fields and energy industry on Kharg Island.”
Has Iran been preparing for a potential US attack?
Iran’s Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf said in March that “Iran’s enemies, with the support of one of the regional countries” were preparing to occupy one of the country’s islands, without directly naming the island. Iran laid traps and moved additional military personnel and air defenses to Kharg Island in recent weeks in preparation for a possible US operation to take control of the island, according to multiple people familiar with US intelligence reporting on the issue. The island already has layered defenses, and the Iranians have moved additional shoulder-fired, surface-to-air guided missile systems known as MANPADs there in recent weeks, the sources said.
Has the US attacked the island before?
Yes. Trump said in March the US had bombed “every military target” on the island and threatened to attack its oil infrastructure if Iran continued blocking ships from traversing the Strait of Hormuz. Video posted to Truth Social and geolocated by CNN showed US strikes on the island’s airport facilities, with large explosions and black smoke visible throughout the footage.Trump said on the same day that Kharg was “not high on the list, but it’s one of so many different things, and I can change my mind in seconds.”But as far back as 1988, decades before he was elected, Trump has talked about invading the island. “One bullet shot at one of our men or ships and I’d do a number on Kharg Island. I’d go in and take it,” he told The Guardian in an interview at the time.White House officials believe taking Kharg Island would “totally bankrupt” Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, according to one official, and could potentially lead to a swift end of the war. But many inside the administration are wary of such a move, particularly given it would require a significant number of ground troops to achieve.

China and Russia veto UN resolution on protecting Hormuz shipping
Reuters/07 April/2026
China and Russia vetoed a UN resolution encouraging states to coordinate efforts to protect commercial shipping in the Strait of Hormuz on Tuesday and the US ambassador to the world body called on “responsible nations” to join the US in securing the vital waterway. The 15-member Security Council voted 11 in favor of the resolution presented by Bahrain, with two against - China and Russia - and two abstentions.US President Donald Trump threatened that “a whole civilization will die tonight” as Iran showed no sign of accepting his ultimatum to open the Strait of Hormuz by Tuesday evening, Washington time. Oil prices have surged since the US and Israel struck Iran at the end of February, unleashing a conflict that has run for more than five weeks while Tehran has largely closed the Strait that was previously the route for about a fifth of global oil and liquefied natural gas.
“The draft resolution has not been adopted, owing to the negative vote of a permanent member of the Council, Bahrain’s Foreign Minister Abdullatif bin Rashid Al Zayani said.
US ambassador condemns the vetoes
The US ambassador to the United Nations, Mike Waltz, condemned the Russian and Chinese vetoes, saying they marked “a new low” when Iran’s shutting of the Strait was preventing medical aid and supplies reaching humanitarian crises in the Congo, Sudan and Gaza. “No one should tolerate that. They are holding the global economy at gunpoint. But today, Russia and China did tolerate it. They sided with a regime that seeks to intimidate the Gulf into submission, even as it brutalizes its own people.”Waltz said Iran could choose “to reopen the Strait, to seek peace and to make amends. “But until then and afterwards, we call on responsible nations to join us in securing the Strait of Hormuz, protecting it, ensuring that it remains open to lawful commerce, to humanitarian goods, and the free movement of the world’s goods,” he said.
France deplored the vetoes.
“The aim was to encourage strictly, purely defensive measures to provide the security and safety for the Strait without spiraling towards escalation,” its UN ambassador Jerome Bonnafont said. China and Russia used their vetoes even though Bahrain had significantly weakened its draft after China opposed authorizing force. The draft submitted to a vote dropped any authorization of the use of force. An explicit reference to binding enforcement, included in an earlier draft, was also left out. Instead the text strongly encouraged States “to coordinate efforts, defensive in nature, commensurate to the circumstances, to contribute to ensuring the safety and security of navigation across the Strait of Hormuz.”It also said such contributions could include “the escort of merchant and commercial vessels,” and endorsed efforts “to deter attempts to close, obstruct or otherwise interfere with international navigation through the Strait of Hormuz.”

China, Russia sink UN vote on Strait of Hormuz; 10 countries join US in support
Sophie Brams/The Hill/ April 7, 2026
A Bahrain-led resolution aimed at reopening the Strait of Hormuz failed at the United Nations on Tuesday, unable to withstand opposition from Russia and China despite attempts to weaken its provisions to win their support. Nearly a dozen countries — Bahrain, Democratic Republic of Congo, Denmark, France, Greece, Latvia, Liberia, Panama, Somalia, United Kingdom and the U.S. — voted in favor of the resolution, while Colombia and Pakistan abstained. However, the veto by Russia and China, both permanent members of the U.N. Security Council, ultimately sank it. The nations’ leaders were not swayed by warnings from Bahrain’s foreign minister that continued closure of the strait, a key passageway that transports nearly 20 percent of the world’s oil supply, would cause greater economic instability and undermine the Security Council’s authority. “Such a scenario would inevitably be replicated in other straits and waterways, thereby transforming the world into a jungle where force, arrogance and hegemony prevail and where international laws are utterly disregarded,” Abdullatif bin Rashid Al-Zayani, acting as chair, said ahead of the vote. The watered-down resolution encouraged “states interested in the use of commercial maritime routes in the Strait of Hormuz to coordinate efforts, defensive in nature, commensurate with the circumstances, to contribute to ensuring the safety and security of navigation across the Strait of Hormuz,” according to The Associated Press. The original proposal would have authorized countries to use “all necessary means” to ensure transit through the strategic channel and deter attempts to close it — but the language was softened over the course of several days to appease concerns from China, Russia and France about approving the use of force. The draft, which was voted on Tuesday, eliminated references to Security Council authorization and limited the provisions strictly to the strait rather than extending to adjacent waters. It also demanded that Iran halt attacks on civilian infrastructure in the region and stop interfering with vessels attempting to transit the strait safely. In explaining his country’s objection, Vasily Nebenzya, Russia’s representative to the U.N., condemned U.S. and Israeli aggression toward Iran and argued the resolution was rife with “unbalanced, inaccurate and confrontational elements.” China argued the language of the resolution was one-sided and “highly susceptible to misinterpretation or even abuse.” “At a time when the United States is openly threatening this very survival of a civilization, the current hostilities imposed on Iran is very likely to further escalate,” said Fu Cong, China’s U.N. representative.
Shipping traffic through the critical maritime choke point has been stymied for more than five weeks as Tehran seeks to use it as a bargaining chip to end the conflict. The de facto blockade, coupled with escalating attacks on energy infrastructure in Iran and neighboring Persian Gulf countries, has raised fears of prolonged fuel and food supply disruptions and inflationary pressures on the global market. The conflict has pushed the price of Brent crude oil, the international benchmark, repeatedly above $100 per barrel. The World Food Programme has also estimated that 45 million more people could fall into extreme hunger if it does not end by June. Mike Waltz, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N., slammed Russia and China’s opposition to the resolution as “a new low” and accused Tehran of “holding the global economy at gunpoint.”
“I will note today’s result does not restrict the United States to continue to act in its own self-defense and in the collective defense, and President Trump will continue the actions necessary to defend our people and the free world,” Waltz said. Trump has given the Iranian regime until 8 p.m. EDT Tuesday to make a deal that would reopen the strait, threatening to unleash “all Hell” on the country by striking bridges and power plants if his deadline is not met.“A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don’t want that to happen, but it probably will,” the president wrote in a Truth Social post Tuesday morning, despite warnings that strikes on civilian infrastructure could violate international law. Iran’s ambassador to the U.N., Amir Saeid Iravani, pushed back against Trump’s threat during the Security Council meeting Tuesday, insisting the country will retaliate against any attacks.
“There must be no doubt Iran will take all necessary measures to defend its people, safeguard its sovereignty and territorial integrity and protect its vital national interest with full resolve,” Iravani said. “The United States and the Israeli regime will bear responsibility for all subsequent consequences, regional and international.”Iran has defiantly refused a plan for a temporary ceasefire, dismissing the proposal as “unrealistic” and demanding a permanent end to the hostilities. Copyright 2026 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

Iran has attacked Saudi Arabia's Jubail petrochemical complex, IRGC says
Reuters/ April 7, 2026
April 7 (Reuters) - Iran on Tuesday attacked Saudi Arabia's Jubail petrochemical complex, the heart of the kingdom's downstream sector, its Revolutionary Guards said, the latest evidence of Tehran's ability ‌to strike back in response to U.S.-Israeli attacks ahead of a U.S. deadline to open the ‌Strait of Hormuz. Iran said the attack was in response to attacks against its Asaluyeh petrochemical plants, which are connected to its massive ​South Pars gas field and were reportedly hit by multiple explosions overnight. U.S. President Donald Trump's ultimatum to Iran to open the Strait of Hormuz oil chokepoint by the end of Tuesday or face bombing of civilian infrastructure would be the biggest escalation yet of the war. Iran has warned it would target similar infrastructure in ‌the Gulf. Hormuz's closure has sent ⁠global energy prices surging. Iran has shown it retains the ability to strike targets in neighbouring countries and effectively shut transit through the Strait, previously a conduit for ⁠a fifth of global oil supply. Jubail, a sprawling industrial city, houses multi-billion dollar joint ventures between state-backed oil giant Saudi Aramco and its petrochemical subsidiary SABIC, and Western energy majors. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said the attacks were "in ​response ​to the enemy's crimes in the aggression against (Iran's) Asaluyeh ​petrochemical plants," which had reportedly been hit by ‌several explosions overnight. It was not immediately clear which facility or facilities were hit in Saudi Arabia. Video footage verified by Reuters showed smoke and flames rising from the direction of Jubail. The IRGC said in a statement it had "effectively targeted with medium-range missiles and several suicide drones" the Sadara complex, a $20 billion joint venture between Aramco and Dow that was shut last week, and other facilities in Jubail including one belonging ‌to ExxonMobil. The IRGC also said it hit a petrochemical ​facility in nearby Juaymah. It indicated the facility was owned by ​Chevron Phillips but the company does not ​appear to have any facilities there, but rather in Jubail. A spokesperson for Chevron Phillips ‌Chemical said on Tuesday the company "is aware ​of the reports and can ​confirm its facilities in Saudi Arabia were not directly impacted."Saudi Arabia's defence ministry earlier said that air defences intercepted and destroyed seven ballistic missiles launched towards the kingdom's eastern region, adding that ​debris from the intercepted missiles fell ‌near energy facilities. Aramco declined to comment on reported attacks in Jubail and Juaymah. The Saudi ​government communications office and SABIC did not immediately respond to Reuters' requests for comment.

Netanyahu says Israel struck railways, bridges in Iran
Al Arabiya English/07 April/2026
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel struck on Tuesday railways and bridges in Iran used by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), after Iranian officials reported damage to at least two bridges and railway infrastructure. “We are crushing the terror regime in Iran... with even greater vigor and with increasing force,” Netanyahu said in a video released by his office.“Yesterday, our pilots destroyed transport aircraft and dozens of helicopters at an Iranian Air Force base. Today they struck the railways and bridges used by the [IRGC].”In a statement, the Israeli military said it struck “eight bridge segments that were utilized by the Iranian terror regime’s Armed Forces for transporting weapons and military equipment in several areas across Iran, including Tehran, Karaj, Tabriz, Kashan, and Qom.”Israeli military spokesman Brigadier General Effie Defrin said “air force pilots continue to deepen the damage to the Iranian terror regime.”“We eliminated several regime commanders last night and struck key infrastructure it used,” he wrote in a post on X. The announcement of the strikes came as US President Donald Trump warned “a whole civilization will die” if a midnight deadline for a deal to open the Strait of Hormuz was not met.Trump had warned that unless Tehran allowed free passage through the strategic oil chokepoint by midnight GMT, the United States would unleash what he called the “complete demolition” of Iran’s critical infrastructure, including bridges and power plants.With AFP

US, Israel strike Iran petrochemicals hub
AFP, Tehran/08 April ,2026
The United States and Israel hit an Iranian petrochemicals hub in the country’s southwest on Tuesday, without causing any casualties, Iranian media reported the authorities as saying. Five people had been killed in a previous strike on the site in Mahshahr on Saturday, according to a local Iranian official. “At 11:40 p.m. (2040 GMT) on Tuesday, Amir Kabir Petrochemical in Mahshahr was attacked by American and Zionist enemies. No casualties have been reported,” said Valiollah Hayati, the deputy governor of the southwestern Khuzestan province, quoted by the state-sponsored Mehrs news agency. The agency had reported earlier that the company’s public relations manager “announced the enemy’s assault on one of the units of this complex in the Mahshahr special zone.”

JD Vance On Call for Iran Backup After Trump Given Ultimatum
The Daily Beast/April 7, 2026
Vice President JD Vance is poised to enter ceasefire discussions with Iran. As Trump’s war intensifies, negotiations are currently being led by the president’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, and Special Envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff. However, a report last month claimed that Iran was done with the pair and would deal only with Vance. Iran had insisted that it wanted to deal with the vice president directly, rather than through intermediaries such as Kushner and Witkoff.

Iran-backed Iraqi armed group release kidnapped US journalist
FRANCE 24/April 7, 2026
American journalist Shelly Kittleson, was kidnapped from a Baghdad streetcorner last week, has been released, an Iraqi official with direct knowledge of the situation said on Tuesday. Kittleson was freed in the afternoon, said the official, who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to comment publicly. He did not share her current whereabouts but said that prior to her release, she had been held in Baghdad.The powerful Iran-backed Iraqi armed group Kataib Hezbollah said in a statement earlier on Tuesday that it would release Kittleson. The group said its decision came “in appreciation of the patriotic stances of the outgoing prime minister", Mohammed Shia al-Sudani, without giving more details. It added that “this initiative will not be repeated in the future”.The statement added a condition — that Kittleson must “leave the country immediately” upon her release. The US State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Kataib Hezbollah had not previously acknowledged that it was the one responsible for Kittleson’s abduction, although both US and Iraqi officials had pointed fingers at the group. Two officials within the armed group, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment publicly, told the AP that in exchange for freeing Kittleson, several members of the group who had previously been detained by Iraqi authorities would be released. Kittleson, 49, a freelance journalist, had lived abroad for years before the kidnapping, using Rome as her base for a time and building a respected journalism career across the Middle East, particularly in Iraq and Syria. Like many freelancers, she often worked on a shoestring budget and without the protections afforded by large news organisations to staff.
She had entered Iraq again shortly before her abduction. US officials have said that they warned her multiple times of threats against her, but that she did not want to leave. Iraqi officials have said that two cars were involved in the kidnapping, one of which crashed while being pursued near the town of al-Haswa in Babil province, southwest of Baghdad. The journalist was then transferred to a second car that fled the scene. Three Iraqi officials said earlier Tuesday that attempts to negotiate her release had run into obstacles. The two Iraqi security officials and one official from the pro-Iran Coordination Framework political bloc spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak about the sensitive case publicly. One of the security officials said that an official with the Popular Mobilization Forces, a coalition of Iran-backed militias that is nominally under the control of the Iraqi military, had been tasked with communicating with the abductors to secure Kittleson’s release but had run into difficulties in communicating with the Kataib Hezbollah leadership. “The primary challenge is that the leaders of the Kataib armed group — specifically, the commanders of the battalions — are nowhere to be found. No one knows their whereabouts, and the process of establishing contact with them is extremely complex,” they said. “These leaders have gone underground, maintaining no active lines of communication, out of fear of being targeted.”The political official said a message had been sent to the Kataib leadership to determine their demands in exchange for releasing the kidnapped journalist. Iraqi authorities are willing to release six Kataib Hezbollah members who are currently detained, most of them in connection with attacks on a US base in Syria, they said. Kataib Hezbollah has previously been accused of kidnapping foreigners. Elizabeth Tsurkov, a Princeton graduate student with Israeli and Russian citizenship, disappeared in Baghdad in 2023. After she was freed and handed over to US authorities in September 2025, she said that she had been held by Kataib Hezbollah.The group never officially claimed responsibility for kidnapping her.Iran-backed militias in Iraq have also launched regular attacks on US facilities in the country since the beginning of the US-Israeli war on Iran.
(FRANCE 24 with AFP and AP)

Qatar says four wounded after Iran launches barrage against Gulf states
AFP/08 April ,2026
Qatar said early on Wednesday four people had been hurt by falling missile debris, including a child, after Iran launched a barrage of projectiles toward Gulf states. AFP reporters heard explosions in Doha and Bahrain’s capital Manama, while authorities in the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia said they had responded to missile threats. The overnight attacks came hours before a US deadline warning Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz or face devastating strikes on its civilian infrastructure. Qatar’s interior ministry said the authorities were “dealing with an incident” after debris from intercepted Iranian missiles fell on a home in the Muriykh area of west Doha. “The incident resulted in the recording of four moderate injuries, including a Qatari child,” the statement added. The UAE’s ministry of defense said in a statement that its military was “dealing with missile and drone attacks coming from Iran.”Saudi Arabia’s defense ministry spokesperson announced the “interception and destruction of five ballistic missiles launched toward the eastern province.”

Bahrain’s main port to temporarily suspend operations from early Wednesday
Al Arabiya English/07 April/2026
Bahrain’s main port will suspend operations starting early Wednesday, around the time of a US deadline for Iran to agree to a deal or face attacks on civilian infrastructure. “Operations in Khalifa bin Salman Port will be temporarily suspended from early April 8. We continuously adapt our operations to the circumstances and have, as a result, temporarily paused operations in recent weeks when needed,” APM Terminals Bahrain, which operates the port, told AFP. At the same time, Kuwait asked residents to avoid going outside from midnight until Wednesday morning, hours ahead of the US deadline for Iran. “The interior ministry tells citizens and residents that it is crucial to stay at home and avoid going out, unless absolutely urgent, from midnight Tuesday April 7 until 6 a.m. Wednesday April 8,” it said in a statement shared on X. Iran has repeatedly targeted Gulf countries shortly after the US-Israeli war with Iran began on February 28, despite the Gulf states’ public stance that they would not allow their territory to be used for attacks on Iran. With AFP

Kuwait interior ministry urges residents to stay in starting from midnight
AFP/07 April/2026
Kuwait asked residents to avoid going outside from midnight until Wednesday morning, hours ahead of a US deadline for Iran to agree to a deal or suffer major strikes on civilian infrastructure.
“The interior ministry tells citizens and residents that it is crucial to stay at home and avoid going out, unless absolutely urgent, from midnight Tuesday April 7 until 6 a.m. Wednesday April 8,” it said in a statement shared on X.

Links to several television channels and newspapers
Asharq Al-Awsat Newspaper
https://aawsat.com/
National News Agency
https://www.nna-leb.gov.lb/ar
Al Arabiya/Arabic
https://www.alarabiya.net/
Sky News
https://www.youtube.com/@SkyNewsArabia
Nidaa Al Watan
https://www.nidaalwatan.com/
Al Markazia
https://www.nidaalwatan.com/
Al Hadath  
https://www.youtube.com/@AlHadath
Independent Arabia
https://www.independentarabia.com/

The Latest LCCC analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on April 07-08/2026
Germany's 'National Interest' and Fragile Support for Israel
Nils A. Haug and Gerhard Werner Schlicke/Gatestone Institute/April 7, 2026
"This historic responsibility of Germany is part of my country's Staatsräson. That means, for me as German Chancellor, the security of Israel is never negotiable. And if that is the case, then these must not remain empty words in the hour of truth." — Germany's then Chancellor Angela Merkel, March 18, 2008. "What the Israeli army is doing in the Gaza Strip, I no longer understand the goal..." —German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, May 2025. Perhaps if German children had been beheaded or burned alive in their beds on October 7, 2023, he would have a clearer understanding of Israel's "goal" in the Gaza Strip. "The memory of the Holocaust continues to serve as a moral compass for and key pillar of German Identity. However, this is changing as old generations are passing away, antisemitic attacks rise and there is an increased pragmatism in German foreign policy." — Maastricht Diplomat, December 3, 2025.
Is "pragmatism," then, the new term in Germany for condoning antisemitism?
In Germany, is support for its Jewish minority and the State of Israel as government policy and "reasons of state" -- known as Staatsräson, or, more vaguely, the "core national interest" -- still prioritized, or has Germany begun to renege on its hitherto moral commitments?
According to Australian economist Gordon de Brouwer:
"The national interest has three components -- security, prosperity, and social wellbeing—and they should all be part of framing the problem and solutions. Security underpins prosperity, prosperity creates power and pays for security, and a well-functioning society reduces economic and security risks.... a country should identify the risks to the national interest broadly defined and look for practical ways to mitigate those risks."
In Germany, the term Staatsräson has come to be used for the state's obligations towards its Jewish community and the state of Israel, following the Third Reich's "final solution" during WWII – the murder of more than six million Jews – in its quest to eliminate all the Jews of Europe. By the end of the war, social normalcy between Christians and the country's remaining Jews no longer existed to any significant degree in Germany. A cultural and moral vacuum ensued. The postwar West German government nobly acknowledged an overriding obligation to ensure the revival of its state to ensure that it would never undergo such a mass moral failure. It initiated ways of restoring the fractured social compact between Germany's citizens and the state. Political action was oriented toward benefiting all communities – not for a war machine as in the past, but for social harmony and cohesion.
For a time in Germany, Staatsräson was considered an obligation to the country's small Jewish community, which has grown from 15,000 members in 1950 to roughly 100,000, out of a current population of 84 million, or 0.12%. The state had positioned its "core national interest" toward the protection and welfare of the few Jews under its watch, including as well their ancestral homeland, Israel. By the early 2000s, this Staatsräson came to be spoken of as a primary component of foreign policy -- one which considered support for Israel as unalterably connected to Germany's reason for existence.
The Staatsräson policy, however -- perhaps inexplicably, perhaps not -- was never codified into enforceable law. The policy does not appear in Germany's constitution, nor in any legislation. Consequently, Germany's support for Israel, conceivably based on shame rather than on moral conviction, can still be debated. On March 18, 2008, Germany's then Chancellor Angela Merkel doubled down on the importance of the Staatsräson for the security of Israel, saying:
"This historic responsibility of Germany is part of my country's Staatsräson. That means, for me as German Chancellor, the security of Israel is never negotiable. And if that is the case, then these must not remain empty words in the hour of truth."
Merkel forthrightly acknowledged Germany's "perpetual responsibility for the moral catastrophe of German history" and pledged the country's support for both Israel and Jews.
In 2025, amidst the Hamas-Israel war, Germany's President Frank-Walter Steinmeier hosted Israel's President Isaac Herzog on the 60th anniversary of diplomatic relations between the countries. In line with Merkel's approach, Steinmeier graciously acknowledged that establishing relations in 1965 was "a gift that we Germans could not have expected after the horrors of the Second World War."
When Germany considers its national interests, Israel's security should surely be among its highest priorities. Apart from historic factors, Israel is the sole democracy in the region and the lone upholder of the values of Western civilization with which Germany, one assumes, identifies. Israel is a primary source of intelligence information for the continent's security agencies, which is important given the mass migration of Muslims into Europe, including Germany.
Similarly, when taking into account its past conduct, Germany's social well-being would be well-served by adhering to its Staatsräson policy towards Israel. Notwithstanding Germany's solid aid to Israel during its early years when the nation faced grave threats, such as during period preceding the Six-Day (1967), the situation in recent times appears to have altered.
In May 2025, following a meeting between Herzog and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, Al-Monitor reported:
"While Berlin, now led by conservative Chancellor Friedrich Merz, says support for Israel remains a core principle, relations have come under strain in recent years, over the Gaza war and other issues."Since Hamas's invasion of Israel on October 7, 2023, the relationship between Germany and Israel has become strained by injudicious claims against the latter of "disproportionate" responses, allegedly resulting in unnecessary civilian deaths.
Ignoring facts on the ground, the complexity of the situation, and Israel's moral obligation to its residents, Merz castigated Israel by saying it "must also remain a country that lives up to its humanitarian obligations, especially as this terrible war is raging in the Gaza Strip."
"What the Israeli army is doing in the Gaza Strip, I no longer understand the goal... To harm the civilian population in such a way... can no longer be justified as a fight against terrorism," Merz said in a May 2025 televised interview. Perhaps if German children had been beheaded or burned alive in their beds on October 7, 2023, he would have a clearer understanding of Israel's "goal" in the Gaza Strip.
At the height of the war in Gaza, Merz, adding insult to injury, imposed a ban on supplying of weapons to Israel, despite contractual obligations and his prior voiced "non-negotiable" support. As Israel's second most important foreign supplier of munitions, Germany's decision had serious implications for Israel.
Germany also did not intervene in Israel's legal defense against meritless charges filed by South Africa at the International Court of Justice. Germany also refused to provide a guarantee that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would not be arrested under an International Criminal Court warrant, should he happen to visit.
Leftism in Germany is alive and well, which could augur poorly for its political and moral commitment to Staatsräson. According to the Maastricht Diplomat:
"For example, the far-left [German] party Die Linke's portrays Israel as a colonial oppressor and equates it with Nazi Germany... This directly contradicts the 'Staatsräson'... Moreover, several authors point out a gradual decline of this feeling of responsibility towards Israel..."
As "anti-Zionism" – the politically correct term for hating Jews -- has become popular, the future for Staatsräson begins to look even more fragile. The question then is, will Germany honor Angela Merkel's promise of unconditional support for Israel as it is fighting to preserve Western civilization against totalitarian barbarism, or will it merely pay lip-service? Specifically, will Germany stand alongside Israel, supporting it in the European Union and in forums such as the United Nations and others? Perhaps even more importantly, will Germany sell Israel the weapons and ammunition it requires at times of existential danger? Indications are that the historic promise of unconditional support is withering fast.
Israel's present war against Iran and its proxies may not be the last it fights, given the surrounding hordes of jihadists keen to annihilate all Jews and wipe out Israel. For the foreseeable future, Israel will be forced to rely on allies such as the US for some of its military supplies until it becomes self-sufficient. In the interim, with a global red-green alliance and Germany's rapidly growing Muslim population, its supportive policy towards Israel appears to have become even more tenuous.
According to the Maastricht Diplomat:
"The memory of the Holocaust continues to serve as a moral compass for and key pillar of German Identity. However, this is changing as old generations are passing away, antisemitic attacks rise and there is an increased pragmatism in German foreign policy."
Is "pragmatism," then, the new term in Germany for condoning antisemitism?
Nils A. Haug is an author and columnist. A lawyer by profession, he is member of the International Bar Association, the National Association of Scholars, the Academy of Philosophy and Letters. Among degrees in Philosophy, English Literature, and Law, Dr. Haug holds a M.A.in Jewish Studies (cum laude) and a Ph.D. in Apologetical Theology. He is author of 'Politics, Law, and Disorder in the Garden of Eden – the Quest for Identity'; and 'Enemies of the Innocent – Life, Truth, and Meaning in a Dark Age.' His work has been published by First Things Journal, The American Mind, Quadrant, Minding the Campus, Gatestone Institute, National Association of Scholars, Jewish Journal, James Wilson Institute (Anchoring Truths), Jewish News Syndicate, Tribune Juive, Document Danmark, Zwiedzaj Polske, Schlaglicht Israel, and others.
**Gerhard Werner Schlicke is a retired Lecturer at the University of Applied Sciences in Saxony, and columnist for the German-language news site, Israel-Nachrichten.
© 2026 Gatestone Institute. All rights reserved. The articles printed here do not necessarily reflect the views of the Editors or of Gatestone Institute.

Iran Is More of the Enemy of the Arabs Than the Gulf
Mamdouh al-Muhainy/Asharq Al-Awsat/April 07/2026
Some intellectuals and commentators argue that while the Iranian regime is waging a war against the Gulf states, it is not necessarily an enemy of the Arab world. They claim that Gulf states seek to drag other Arab states into needless hostilities with Iran. In reality, however, Tehran is more of an enemy of Arab countries than even to the Gulf states themselves. It has done far greater harm to other non-Gulf Arab states than it has to the Gulf. There are two reasons for this:
First: the Iranian regime has exploited the fragility of certain Arab states, penetrated them, and effectively occupied them. That has not happened in the Gulf.
Second: Tehran has succeeded in weakening these countries’ national identity, investing in sectarian identities, and creating schism among citizens in other Arab states, but failed to do so in the Gulf. On the first point: several Arab countries have suffered far more at the hands of the Iranian regime than the Gulf states have from Iran’s missiles and drones, as the latter has only caused temporary material damage that can be repaired. The war has demonstrated the effectiveness of Gulf states’ advanced air defenses and their ability to protect their territories. They will emerge victorious from this confrontation, while the Iranian regime will be weakened and devastated. Gulf states have remained resistant to Iranian infiltration despite Tehran’s attempts to build cells and carry out terrorist operations across the Gulf. For decades, Iran’s hostility toward the Gulf has been a source of concern, but the Gulf has remained resilient and has never been paralyzed economically nor seen their policy-making hijacked. Other Arab countries have been deeply affected by Iran. Take Iraq, for example. Iraq has great potential, human capital, and a rich history, and Iranian interference has severely weakened the country. After 2003, Tehran exploited a political and security vacuum in Iraq and built a deep network of influence within the state. It created proxy militias and pulled the strings. Iraqi national figures were forced into silence or exile when they objected to Iran’s dominance over their country.
Iran’s hostility toward Iraq appears to have had far more destructive consequences than it has on Gulf states, which are capable of protecting themselves. The result is that this country with vast resources has had its sovereignty and independence undermined.
Lebanon offers another example. Mass destruction has been wreaked on the country due to the Iranian regime. Hezbollah has tied Lebanese politics to Iran’s regional project, with clear consequences: paralysis of state institutions, economic collapse, and international isolation.
Syria continues to suffer from the repercussions of Iranian dominance. Elements of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps have intervened there directly, and Syrian territory hosted sectarian militias from a variety of places. Syrians have paid enormous human and material costs as a result of this intervention.
Palestine and Yemen are other examples. Iran’s role has been more damaging there than in the Gulf, which has preserved its sovereignty and resources.
The second reason is its exploitation of sectarian identity at the expense of national identity. Tehran has weakened the national consciousness of several Arab countries while strengthening sectarian loyalties. We have seen citizens of some Arab countries show stronger allegiance to Ali Khamenei, Hassan Nasrallah, or Qassem Soleimani than to their own states.
Tehran has managed to build parallel systems within these countries, such as schools, media, and social institutions, creating a “state within a state” and a “society within a society.” It has tied communities to an ideological doctrine of sacrifice and martyrdom in service of its project. The result has been catastrophic, with citizens of the same country becoming enemies.
This has not occurred in the Gulf states, which have fought extremists linked to Iran’s project and reinforced their national identity. Moreover, strong state institutions and economic development in the Gulf continues to present a bulwark to transnational loyalties.
When I speak of the Gulf, I do not mean only its citizens, but everyone who lives on its soil, including Arab, foreign, and even Iranian nationals. Ultimately, the Gulf presents a model of civilization that is not tied to a narrow identity; it is built on strong statehood, economic success, religious tolerance, social openness, and integration into the modern world that accommodates all. I oppose chauvinistic division. The irony, however, is that the same intellectuals and commentators who embrace bigotry align themselves with Iran despite how evident it is that the Iranian regime’s hostility for Arab states is broader, harsher, and more dangerous than its hostility toward the Gulf. So why do they celebrate it?

Us… And Israel in Its ‘Kahanist’ Era!
Eyad Abu Shakra/Asharq Al-Awsat/April 07/2026
It would be fair to say that Israel’s current government is the most extreme since the country’s founding in 1948; I believe that this is indeed the case, though I was not a witness to the founding event itself.
Since that time, like many others, I have had the opportunity to read about Jewish history, the history of the Zionist movement, the history of religious conflicts in Europe, and the history of Western colonialism in the Third World, including the Arab world... “the Persians and the Berbers, and those who had been part of this era of great power,” as our great scholar Abd al-Rahman Ibn Khaldun once said. I have also been fortunate enough not to have drawn the modest knowledge I accumulated solely from my Arab environment, which is only a segment of a broader global civilization, and to have benefited from living and studying in the West for nearly half a century. Over this long period, my horizons broadened, and many assumptions I had grown up with (shared by generations of my peers, family, acquaintances, and friends) dissipated. Incidentally, after this half-century, I do not claim to have become more aware or more knowledgeable... I now merely recognize the extent of ignorance- that there is much I do not know.
Among the assumptions that collapsed for me was the simplistic and absolutist view of the Arab-Israeli conflict, especially on the Israeli side. In Lebanon of the 1950s and 1960s (specifically up until June 1967) Jewish people were not alien to my social world or culture. The decades that followed, however, shook many assumptions that had been taken for granted. I no longer see Israel as a “small entity” that could be overrun in a day or two, for one thing. It has also become clear to me that Israel is not an “orphan.” It has allies, patrons, and protectors, and it has “lobbies” whose power, influence, and weight we are only now beginning to grasp.
That said, I have never approached this question with fascination- certainly not the kind of fascination that leads to unconditional surrender. Unconditional surrender is not a viable foundation for any relationship between peoples. Any relationship between groups, even adversaries, must be built on honesty, candor, and mutual respect for the right to a dignified life... as well as sincere belief in humane values, justice, and the rule of law, without discrimination, domination, oppression, or exclusion.
The Zionist movement, in turn, has undergone many transformations. It had initially been composed of a diverse and even contradictory intellectual and political factions. Today’s Israel is ruled by the right-wing government is headed by Benjamin Netanyahu (a student of the “Revisionism” pioneered by Zeev Jabotinsky and brought to power by Menachem Begin. However, the country was not always right-wing.
Indeed, socialist Zionist factions had been dominant in Israel at first. Mapai (the Workers’ Party of Israel) was the strongest of these parties. Mapai, the Histadrut (the labor federation), and cooperative farming experience (kibbutzim and moshavim) defined the early settlement period. These even had their own sports clubs under the name “Hapoel” (the worker). Alongside Mapai, and before and after it, other moderate socialist parties, most notably Mapam and Ahdut HaAvoda were also prominent.
But that era is now past. Today is the “age of the right”... indeed, the far right.
Political life in Israel now stretches across a spectrum that begins with the “moderate right,” (figures like Yair Lapid, former interim prime minister and leader of the opposition party Yesh Atid) and ends with the most extreme settler-driven fascist right: the Kahanist “Jewish Power” party led by National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, and the Religious Zionism party led by Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich.
It is worth noting, for those who may not remember, that the extremist American rabbi Meir Kahane (1930–1990) founded the terrorist Kach party and was assassinated by the Egyptian youth El Sayyid Nosair.
Today, Kahane’s “disciples” have come together in Ben Gvir’s party, whose parliamentary bloc includes five of the Knesset's extreme members. They are led by MP Yitzhak Kroizer, who recently said: “Killing Palestinian children is normal if it serves the mission of the Israeli army” (!!), and MP Limor Son Har-Melech, who was among the most prominent sponsors of a bill calling for the execution of Palestinian prisoners.Under these circumstances, there is no longer room in Israel for a real democratic contest between right, center, and left. There can be no democracy, no rule of law, and no chance for balanced coexistence when the National Security Minister (Ben Gvir) openly arms settler militias before the eyes of the global press, and the Finance Minister (Smotrich) allocates vast sums to demolish homes, finance wars, and build more settlements in accordance with “Torah teachings” and Talmudic injunctions... while the Knesset votes on a law that allows for the execution of Palestinian prisoners (exclusively) in a grotesque tangible manifestation of Israel’s apartheid system..
Of course, that is not to say that there exists a number of reasonable and principled Israeli figures and forces who, along with Jewish individuals across the world, courageously reject this appalling slide toward the “legalization” of racism that follows the mass killings and forced displacement of Palestinians and Lebanese.Just yesterday, the liberal Israeli newspaper Haaretz candidly denounced the death penalty approved by Netanyahu’s government for Palestinian prisoners, arguing it “complete dominance of the Kahanists” over the Israeli right. It is well known that the paper counts objective and principled journalists worried about this dark future for their country among its ranks, including Gideon Levy, Amira Hass, and others. The paradox is that Israel, which is committing massacres before our eyes, destroys hospitals and schools, kills children, and carries out mass displacement, is the very same state that lectures us.

War And Neglecting ‘the Day After’
Nabil Amr/Asharq Al-Awsat/April 07/2026
Those taking part in war bear the pain during military operations, as their full attention is devoted to winning it. Once it winds down- whether due to exhaustion and fatigue, the despair of one side fully crushing the other, or a compromise settlement over demands and objectives - do combatants find themselves dealing with the aftermath. That is when it becomes clear that the pain, and the effort required to address that pain, are far greater. As with people, the pain of states intensifies once the wound cools.
The war raging in the Middle East differs from all previous wars in terms of its duration. We could date it back to the Al-Aqsa Flood Operation, which followed by Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza and the ignition of multiple fronts as its extension; then came the direct involvement of the United States and Iran, turning this regional war into a global crisis whose turbulence has spared no society on the planet. If we add the threats now being made to the damage that has already been done, none of those involved, nor those engaged in mediation efforts to stop it, can tell how far this goes. We cannot overlook what has been said about the possibility of using a tactical nuclear weapon or something close to it either, nor mutual threats to destroy everything reachable by conventional weapons.
Wars born of miscalculation and mutual intransigeance create the possibility of those in charge becoming irrational amid ferocious action and reaction. That is precisely what happened in the Gaza war, where even the most unrestrained imagination could not have anticipated the events that had begun with the earthquake of Al-Aqsa Flood and evolved into the unprecedented genocide in Gaza. However far this war expands or devolves, it must eventually end - either after one side decisively prevailing over the other or once a cessation of hostilities is imposed by exhaustion or a compromise shaped by a third party achieving the near-miracle of mutual concessions once deemed impossible in the literature of war.
When that happens and the war stops, all will return to what was forgotten - or deliberately ignored - during its blaze: what is commonly called “the day after.”
On that day, narratives of victory will flourish. Language and imagination will readily fabricate them, given the urgent need to justify what had happened and grant those in power the legitimacy to manage its consequences. Who can forget the phrase that prevailed after the June 1967 defeat: “What was taken by force can only be recovered by force, and the priority is removing the effects of aggression”?
Israel, victorious in that war, failed in its management of the day after. The ease of victory turned the heads of its leaders, who had seen its outcome as a final resolution of the conflict with the Arabs. Instead, the day after produced fierce Palestinian resistance and a series of wars, small and large, all lacking the one decisive condition: a political solution. The parties to this war will inevitably have to confront the day after with all its dilemmas, which cannot be resolved as easily as pulling a hair out of dough or simply pretending that yesterday has no bearing on today or tomorrow.
The United States, the war’s chief and most powerful sponsor, along with its strong Israeli arm, may find compensation for the money they had spent. However, they will not find a remedy for the political losses they had incurred, especially after entering a perpetual conflict without achieving decisive results to justify the sacrifices made. As for Iran, where poems of victory - celebrating the regime’s survival and its ability to exhaust the “Great Satan” and its lesser ally - began to be written early on. Before this war, Iran had been under a suffocating international blockade that had left one of the richest in the world and a deeply rooted civilization in poverty. On the day after, it will struggle to return to what it had been before the war. And if the blockade and sanctions persist, one can only imagine the scale of the difficulty it will face in addressing them. Israel and Hezbollah, regardless of their relative strength or weakness, will share the bill of the major powers. The day after, despite its gravity and the magnitude of its dilemmas, they will be branches of a larger root. This is most evident for Israel, which boasts and claims that things will not be the same after this conflict. This will not be limited to fixing the destruction inflicted on cities and villages. They will be confronting a different regional and international reality that is far less favorable to its former dominance and influence.
Before this chapter of war, Israel had been isolated and nothing has happened to change that.

X Platform & Facebook Selected twittes on April 07/2026
Ambassador Tom Barrack
The United States condemns in the strongest terms today’s attack on the Israeli Consulate in Istanbul. Attacks on diplomatic missions are attacks on the international order — and an assault on the principles that bind nations together. We commend Türkiye and Turkish security forces for their swift and decisive response.

Ronnie Chatah
Pierre Moawad was a former Lebanese Forces militiaman. He turned the page with disarmament & saluted Samir Geagea’s decision despite punishment under Syrian occupation. He believed in power-sharing & above all defended the state.
He set the example to follow. The exact opposite of Hezbollah.

Roger Bejjani
It has been established that:
1. The 3rd floor over Pierre’s appt. was frequented by men.
2. Someone escaped the crime scene on a motorcycle seconds after the explosion. He was followed by a neighbor. The fugitive was met at Dora by another motorcycle that drove into the pursuing neighbor’s motorcycle and picked up the fugitive and disappeared.
Very simple and easy investigation:
(1) Bring in the owner and his sister (or daughter) and ask them to identify the « users » of the 3rd floor as sanctuary.
(2) divulge the name(s) of the user(s)
with picture(s) on social media and main stream media.
(3) issue arrest warrants in the names of the user(s) of the appartement for endangering knowledgeably the lives of innocent people.