Hezbollah responded Friday to recent Israeli shelling and airstrikes in southern Lebanon by firing rockets into Israel. The incident marks the first time the Shia group fired into Israel since the 2006 war.
Israel said 19 rockets were launched from Lebanon and that it fired back with artillery after the barrage. The back and forth is the most significant escalation between Israel and Hezbollah in years, but no casualties were reported on either side.
Israel’s initial shelling of Lebanon took place late Wednesday after three rockets were fired out of Lebanon, which no group took credit for. Israel responded to the three rockets by firing 92 artillery shells into Lebanon and launching airstrikes.
The Israeli airstrikes were the first Israel admitted to in Lebanon since 2014, although Israeli warplanes frequently enter Lebanese airspace to bomb Syria. In July, Israel bombed Syria from Lebanese airspace, and in the process, the warplanes also struck several villages in northern Lebanon.
The escalation comes as Lebanon is mired in an economic crisis. Wednesday marked the first anniversary of the Beirut port explosion that killed over 200 people and exacerbated the country’s woes.
In warning Hezbollah against further rocket attacks, Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz said Israel could make Lebanon’s crisis even worse. “We do not intend to let Hezbollah toy with us and Hezbollah knows this. Lebanon’s situation is shaky. We can make it even shakier,” he said.
The same could be said about Israel.
Gantz says lots, LOL.
I’m trying to figure out what the Israeli leadership is planning. Is all of this fluff – are they carrying on the netenyahu policy of trying and failing to goad America into war with Iran? Or are they really going to go it alone, invade Lebanon and have a shooting war with Iran? It’s puzzling.
They won’t put themselves in harms way.
A long range missile strike into Iran would trigger the kind of conflagration that will burn US troops in the region. And another forever war…. Our staunch ally.
I think the Israeli government are worried that it wouldn’t. Iran may refrain from direct escalation, and instead get Hezbollah to send a salvo of rockets at Tel Aviv in response. A war in south Lebanon may follow, with no American involvement, but a fair few Israeli soldiers would die. Fear of this course of events may discourage Israeli adventurism.
No one can take Israel to the f**king woodshed like Hezbollah.
At this point, I think a peacekeeping force/tripwire is needed in Occupied Palestine. I don’t say that lightly, since intervention always has unaccounted-for consequences, but it really should be thought out. This could not be a UN-sponsored action, since the resolution would never get out of the Security Council. Maybe Hezbollah is the only regional actor who could pull it off. The siege has got to be broken somehow, someway.
Lebanon’s situation is shaky. We can make it even shakier,” he said.
What nice neighbors, let us send them more guns and bullets before they run out…
BDS!