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Israeli Army Pushing for War on Lebanon 

Israeli army flares fall over the northern Har Dov area on Mount Hermon on November 13, 2023, amid increasing cross-border tensions between Lebanon's Hezbollah and Israel as fighting continues with Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip. (AFP)
Israeli army flares fall over the northern Har Dov area on Mount Hermon on November 13, 2023, amid increasing cross-border tensions between Lebanon's Hezbollah and Israel as fighting continues with Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip. (AFP)
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Israeli Army Pushing for War on Lebanon 

Israeli army flares fall over the northern Har Dov area on Mount Hermon on November 13, 2023, amid increasing cross-border tensions between Lebanon's Hezbollah and Israel as fighting continues with Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip. (AFP)
Israeli army flares fall over the northern Har Dov area on Mount Hermon on November 13, 2023, amid increasing cross-border tensions between Lebanon's Hezbollah and Israel as fighting continues with Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip. (AFP)

The Israeli military command has informed Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that there can be no avoiding a war with Lebanon along with the ongoing conflict in Gaza.

Political sources said there can be no escaping dealing a strong blow against Hezbollah in Lebanon in wake of the Iran-backed party’s latest escalation.

The blow must be painful enough to deter the party from carrying on with its attack, they said, suggesting that Israel may choose to attack Hezbollah’s stronghold in Beirut’s southern suburbs.

Over the past two days, Hezbollah fired rockets deeper into Israel, reaching Akka, Nahariyya and towns around Haifa and western Galilee, noted Israeli military experts.

Tal Lev Ram wrote in Israel’s Maariv that the Israeli military command is facing a dilemma regarding opening a second front with Hezbollah as that would affect decision-making in Gaza.

At the same time, he said, there is a realization that confronting Hezbollah’s hostility can no longer be contained in defense, but cells must be targeted before or after an attack and the party’s infrastructure must also be a target.

There is a need to escalate offensive attacks to make Hezbollah pay, while also avoiding a rapid escalation on the ground that would shift the war towards Lebanon, which would in turn suspend operations against Hamas in Gaza, he added.

Haaretz’s Amos Harel warned that there was a “real danger” of a “misunderstanding” taking place on the northern front with Lebanon. He spoke of a fear that Israel would not be able to control the pace and level of escalation.

Hezbollah, meanwhile, has a broad arsenal at its disposal, including mortars, attack drones, Katyusha rockets and other missiles, he added.

The Israeli army has already started to pay the price with Hezbollah’s attacks reaching Haifa Bay, prompting the military to retaliate by striking 40 kms deep into Lebanon. It struck an Iranian SA-67 surface-to-air missile launcher that Hezbollah uses to down Israeli drones.

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Arab World

Leaders from Lebanon, France and Jordan to Discuss Struggling Lebanese Military

File photo: Lebanese army members stand on a military vehicle during a Lebanese army media tour, to review the army's operations in the southern Litani sector, in Alma Al-Shaab, near the border with Israel, southern Lebanon, November 28, 2025. (Reuters)
File photo: Lebanese army members stand on a military vehicle during a Lebanese army media tour, to review the army's operations in the southern Litani sector, in Alma Al-Shaab, near the border with Israel, southern Lebanon, November 28, 2025. (Reuters)
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Leaders from Lebanon, France and Jordan to Discuss Struggling Lebanese Military

File photo: Lebanese army members stand on a military vehicle during a Lebanese army media tour, to review the army's operations in the southern Litani sector, in Alma Al-Shaab, near the border with Israel, southern Lebanon, November 28, 2025. (Reuters)
File photo: Lebanese army members stand on a military vehicle during a Lebanese army media tour, to review the army's operations in the southern Litani sector, in Alma Al-Shaab, near the border with Israel, southern Lebanon, November 28, 2025. (Reuters)

The heads of state of Lebanon, France and Jordan will meet Thursday in Paris as part of an effort to drum up support for the struggling Lebanese military.

A donor conference for Lebanon's cash-strapped army was initially set to take place in February, led by France, Saudi Arabia and the United States. However, it was postponed following the eruption of the Iran war and the latest round of the Israel-Hezbollah war, The Associated Press said.

The Lebanese army has now found itself caught between the Israeli military — now occupying much of southern Lebanon — and Hezbollah. The militant group has refused calls to give up its weapons.

In June, the Lebanese and Israeli governments announced a framework agreement under which Israel would withdraw gradually from southern Lebanon and the Lebanese army would assume control, while Hezbollah would be disarmed. Implementation of the deal has stalled.

Thursday's meeting in Paris will center on preparing the ground for a donor conference. It will also focus on the situation in southern Lebanon and plans for an international presence there after the mandate of the UN peacekeeping force known as UNIFIL expires at the end of the year, Lebanese President Joseph Aoun's office said in a statement.

Hezbollah was severely weakened in the last war that ended in November 2024, and Lebanon subsequently elected Aoun and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam, who committed to disarming Hezbollah and other non-state armed groups in the country.

Lebanon has been criticized by Israel and the United States for not taking direct military action to force the militant group to disarm.

Lebanese officials are wary of a confrontation between the army and Hezbollah, fearing it could spiral into a civil war. The government has also insisted it needs a larger and better-equipped military to deploy across Lebanon and win over Hezbollah’s supporters who question the army’s ability to protect them.

The small Mediterranean country’s military is underfunded and underequipped, for years relying heavily on international donors, notably the United States, United Kingdom, France and Italy.

Many soldiers had left the military or worked second jobs since the country’s fiscal crisis in late 2019, which affected state institutions that once provided decent salaries and benefits, and locked the savings of millions in the banks. The military has struggled to adequately pay salaries as inflation soars and state budgets shrink.

Arab World

Former Syrian Official Convicted of Torture under Assad Faces Sentencing in the US

Ousted Syrian President Bashar Assad - File Photo
Ousted Syrian President Bashar Assad - File Photo
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Former Syrian Official Convicted of Torture under Assad Faces Sentencing in the US

Ousted Syrian President Bashar Assad - File Photo
Ousted Syrian President Bashar Assad - File Photo

A former Syrian military official convicted of torturing prisoners during President Bashar Assad's regime is facing a possible decades-long prison sentence in the US.

A federal judge in Los Angeles is scheduled to sentence Samir Ousman Alsheikh on Thursday. A jury found him guilty in March of one count of conspiracy to commit torture and three counts of torture while in charge of Syria's infamous Adra Prison from roughly 2005 to 2008, reported The Associated Press.

Human rights groups and United Nations officials have accused the Syrian government of widespread abuses in its detention facilities, including torture and arbitrary detention of thousands of people, in many cases without informing their families.

Prosecutors say Alsheikh, seeking to quash political dissent, sent certain prisoners to a wing of Adra where they were held in small isolation cells and tortured.

At the two-week trial, three victims recounted beatings while suspended from pipes on the ceiling and the use of a device that folded their bodies in half at the waist. One person testified that Alsheikh stomped on the device with his foot, according to the US Department of Justice.

“Defendant knew that what he was doing was wrong,” DOJ prosecutors said in a sentencing memo filed this month. “Nonetheless he ordered and participated in the torture of his victims because he had the power to do so and because he thought he would never be held accountable.”

The memo included statements from several victims, one of whom, Nidal Shikhani, said he can “still hear the screams of others begging for mercy, repeating, ‘Leave me, leave me.’”

The prosecutors asked US District Judge Hernan D. Vera for a minimum sentence of 80 years. Alsheikh's attorneys, Nina Marino and Collin Cate, have called for a five-year sentence, noting that he is 74 years old and has “significant medical and cognitive conditions.”

They also said he was willing to be deported to Syria, where a new government has sought to hold former members of the Assad regime accountable.

“Whatever moral weight this case carries in the broader arc of history — however much the world, or the victims, or the public might wish the sentence to ‘send a message’ — that desire cannot be the foundation of a just sentence,” Marino and Cate wrote in their Sept. 3 memo.

Alsheikh came to the US in 2020 and applied for citizenship, but prosecutors say he concealed his involvement in torture. Federal authorities detained him at Los Angeles International Airport in July 2024.

Jurors also convicted him in March of lying to US immigration authorities and fraudulently obtaining a green card and attempting to naturalize as a US citizen.

Arab World

Syria Arrests Group Accused of Running Fake Sectarian Accounts

The graduation ceremony of the 66th batch of personnel with the rank of guard in Homs. (The Internal Security Forces)
The graduation ceremony of the 66th batch of personnel with the rank of guard in Homs. (The Internal Security Forces)
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Syria Arrests Group Accused of Running Fake Sectarian Accounts

The graduation ceremony of the 66th batch of personnel with the rank of guard in Homs. (The Internal Security Forces)
The graduation ceremony of the 66th batch of personnel with the rank of guard in Homs. (The Internal Security Forces)

Syrian security forces arrested a group in Homs province accused of receiving money from abroad to operate fake sectarian social media accounts and gather information on security checkpoints, the Internal Security Forces said Wednesday.

The arrests in al-Rastan, 25 km north of Homs city, followed electronic surveillance and an investigation, the forces said on Telegram.

According to the statement, the suspects created fake social media accounts carrying sectarian content under instructions from handlers abroad, published fabricated material glorifying the deposed regime, and monitored and photographed several security checkpoints.

Authorities said they also seized what they described as high-quality fabricated videos and images used to undermine public confidence and destabilize civil peace and social stability.

Legal procedures are underway to refer those involved to the judiciary, the Internal Security Forces said.

The forces urged the public to exercise caution over anonymous accounts spreading rumors and to rely on verified official sources for news.

Meanwhile, the Syrian Ministry of Interior celebrated the graduation of the 66th batch of personnel with the rank of guard in Homs.

The ceremony concluded an intensive 80-day training program managed by the Training and Rehabilitation Branch. During the course, the recruits underwent field, behavioral, and military discipline training.

The graduation featured military parades demonstrating the readiness of the internal security forces to preserve public safety and national stability.