Israeli strikes in Lebanon kill Hezbollah commander, militia says
Israel launched attacks in southern Lebanon on Monday against Hezbollah, the Iran-backed militia, saying one of its senior commanders had been killed there, raising concerns that Israel’s fight against Hamas in Gaza could spiral into a broader regional war.
Hezbollah and Israel have regularly fired rockets at each other over the past three months, in some of the most intense fighting along the Lebanese border since Israel and Hezbollah were at war in 2006.
The commander’s killing occurred during Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken’s latest trip to the Middle East, part of the Biden administration’s efforts to prevent the war between Israel and Hamas from spreading to other fronts , and as Israeli officials issued new warnings to their opponents. .
During a visit to northern Israel on Monday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told soldiers guarding the border that Israel was prepared to do “whatever it takes to restore security in the north.”
“Hezbollah wronged us on a massive scale in 2006, and even now continues to seriously wrong us,” he said, referring to Israel’s latest war with Hezbollah, according to a statement from his office.
Concerns about a broader war have preoccupied the United States and its allies since the Hamas-led attacks in Israel on October 7, which killed about 1,200 Israelis and ignited the war in Gaza. These concerns largely center on three Iranian-backed groups: Hezbollah in Lebanon; the militias in Iraq and Syria; and the Houthis in Yemen, who have launched attacks on commercial ships in the Red Sea and prompted the United States to send two aircraft carriers to the eastern Mediterranean in October.
During a visit to Saudi Arabia on Monday, Mr Blinken met briefly with Josep Borrell, the European Union’s top diplomat, to “discuss efforts to prevent the conflict from spreading and to build a lasting peace for the region,” said a spokesperson, Matthew. Miller. Like Mr. Blinken, Mr. Borrell was in Saudi Arabia to meet with the kingdom’s de facto ruler, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
“The Israelis have been very clear with us that they want to find a diplomatic path forward, a diplomatic path forward that creates the kind of security that allows Israelis to return home – nearly 100,000 Israelis have been forced to leave their homes in northern Israel abandoned because of the threat emanating from Hezbollah and Lebanon – but also allowing Lebanese to return to their homes in southern Lebanon,” Mr Blinken said in Saudi Arabia, before flying to Tel Aviv. “And we are working intensively on that effort, and doing so diplomatically.”
The clashes along Israel’s border with Lebanon have led to repeated Israeli warnings of more aggressive military action. More than 130 Hezbollah fighters were killed in the fighting, according to Reuters news agency.
The Biden administration has called for a deal that would remove Hezbollah forces from the border, but with little apparent progress. Although Israeli officials have said time for a diplomatic deal is running out, analysts say Israel is wary of a significant expansion of the conflict with Hezbollah, with the army still engaged in intense fighting in Gaza.
But Lebanese officials have blamed attacks far across the border on Israel, including one last week near Beirut that killed a top Hamas official who was a contact for Hezbollah.
Hezbollah identified the commander killed on Monday as Wissam Hassan al-Tawil. A Lebanese security official, who spoke on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the matter, said he was part of the Radwan unit, which Israel says aims to infiltrate the northern border. The official said Mr al-Tawil was killed in an Israeli attack in Khirbet Selm, a village in southern Lebanon about 15 kilometers from the Israeli border.
The Radwan unit has been at the forefront of Hezbollah’s long-running conflict with Israel and in the cross-border attacks that have escalated in the three months that Israel and Hamas have been at war. Israeli military analysts say Radwan has taken on the mission to conquer Israel’s northern Galilee region.
The origins and composition of the unit are obscure. The group takes its name from the nom de guerre of its former leader, Imad Mughniyeh, who was assassinated in Syria in 2008.
Mr al-Tawil’s role in Hezbollah was not immediately clear. But in an apparent attempt to signal his seniority, Al Manar, a Lebanese broadcaster owned by Hezbollah, posted images of him alongside several senior Hezbollah officials, including the group’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, and Qassim Suleimani, the Iranian general who was assassinated. in a US drone attack in 2020.
The Israeli military made no immediate comment on Monday’s attack. The statement said an Israeli fighter jet had “carried out a series of attacks” hitting a Hezbollah military compound, without providing further details.
A day earlier, the Israeli army said it had killed at least seven Hezbollah members in attacks aimed at destroying the Radwan unit and was ready to attack more of them. Hezbollah’s positions. Israeli Army Chief of Staff Lieutenant General Herzl Halevi said his forces were determined to keep up the pressure on Hezbollah and that if these efforts fell short, Israel was ready to wage “a new war.”
“We will create a completely different reality, or we will have a new war,” he said said Sunday.
Hezbollah attacks damaged an Israeli military base on Saturday, one of the group’s largest attacks on Israel in months of back-and-forth attacks. The powerful Lebanese militia has pledged support to Hamas, and has stepped up attacks on Israel in recent days in response to last week’s killing of Saleh al-Arouri, a senior Hamas leader, outside Beirut.
According to Israeli news media reports, the rocket fire at the Israeli base, the Northern Air Control Unit on Mount Meron, caused significant damage. But the base is still functioning “and has been reinforced with additional systems,” Admiral Daniel Hagari, chief spokesman for the Israeli army, said on Sunday.
Israeli leaders have repeatedly stated in recent weeks that there are only two options to restore calm to the conflict with Hezbollah: a diplomatic solution that would move Radwan forces further from the border, north of the Litani River; or, failing that, a major Israeli military offensive aimed at achieving the same goal.
“Hezbollah is dragging Lebanon into a completely unnecessary war,” Eylon Levy, an Israeli government spokesman, told reporters on Monday.
“We are now at a fork in the road,” he added. “Either Hezbollah withdraws, hopefully as part of a diplomatic solution, or we push the country away.”
Rest, Israeli officials say, is a prerequisite for allowing some 80,000 Israelis evacuated from the area near the border with Lebanon to return to their homes. A similar number of Lebanese have fled their homes on the other side.
Edward Wong contributed reporting from Al Ula, Saudi Arabia.