What to Know about the Growing Conflict between Israel and Lebanon's Hezbollah

The past week has seen a rapid escalation in the nearly yearlong conflict between Israel and Lebanon’s Hezbollah. First came two days of exploding pagers and walkie-talkies used by Hezbollah — deadly attacks pinned on Israel that also maimed civilians across Lebanon.
Hezbollah’s leader vowed to retaliate, and on Friday the militant group launched a wave of rockets into northern Israel, The Associated Press reported. Later in the day, the commander of Hezbollah’s most elite unit was killed in a strike in Beirut that killed dozens more people.
The cross-border attacks ramped up early Sunday, with Hezbollah, an Iranian-backed group that is Lebanon’s most powerful armed force, launching more than 100 rockets deeper into northern Israel, with some landing near the city of Haifa. Israel launched hundreds of strikes on Lebanon.
Then, on Monday, Israel launched a series of strikes that killed more than 490 Lebanese, the deadliest attack since the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah war. Israel warned residents in southern and eastern Lebanon to leave their homes ahead of a spreading air campaign against Hezbollah.
Many fear the escalating violence could lead to an all-out war between Israel and Hezbollah, which would further destabilize a region already shaken by the fighting in Gaza. Both sides have said they don't want that to happen, even as they have defiantly warned of heavier attacks.
Israel and Hezbollah have launched repeated strikes against each other since the Gaza war began, but both sides have pulled back when the spiral of reprisals appeared on the verge of getting out of control, under heavy pressure from the US and its allies. But in recent weeks, Israeli leaders have warned of a possible bigger military operation to stop attacks from Lebanon to allow hundreds of thousands of Israelis displaced by the fighting to return to homes near the border.
Here are some things to know about the situation:
What were the latest strikes? More than 1,600 Lebanese were injured in Monday's deadly strikes and thousands more fled southern Lebanon. Israel said it was targeting Hezbollah weapons sites, and had hit some 1,600 targets. Lebanon's health minister said hospitals, medical centers and ambulances had been struck.
The Israeli military warned residents to immediately leave areas where Hezbollah is storing weapons. The Lebanese media said the evacuation warning was repeated in text messages.
Hezbollah said it had fired dozens of rockets toward Israel, including at military bases, and officials said a series of air-raid sirens were ringing out in northern Israel warning of rocket attacks.
On Friday, an Israeli airstrike brought down a high-rise building in Beirut’s southern suburbs, killing Ibrahim Akil, the commander of Hezbollah’s elite Radwan unit, and other top unit leaders. Israel said Akil led the group’s campaign of rocket, drone and other fire into northern Israel. At least 45 people were killed in that attack and more than 60 wounded.
That strike came after the shock of the electronic device bombings, in which thousands of pagers and walkie-talkies used by Hezbollah detonated on Tuesday and Wednesday. At least 37 people were killed, including two children, and around 3,000 were wounded. Israel has neither confirmed nor denied its involvement.
Analysts say that attack had little effect on Hezbollah’s manpower, but could disrupt its communications and force it to take tighter security measures.
What is the situation on the border? The Israel-Lebanon border has seen almost daily exchanges since the Israel-Hamas war began on Oct. 7. Before Monday, the exchanges had killed around 600 people in Lebanon – mostly fighters but also about 100 civilians — and about 50 soldiers and civilians in Israel. It has also forced hundreds of thousands of people to evacuate homes near the border in both Israel and Lebanon.
Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah promised to retaliate for the electronic device bombings. But Hezbollah also has proved wary of further stoking the crisis. The group faces a difficult balance of stretching the rules of engagement by hitting deeper into Israel in response to its brazen attacks, while at the same time trying to avoid the kind of large-scale attacks on civilian areas that can trigger a full-scale war that it could be blamed for.
Hezbollah says its attacks against Israel are in support of Hamas. Last week, Nasrallah said the barrages won’t end — and Israelis won’t be able to return to homes in the north — until Israel’s campaign in Gaza ends.
What is Israel planning? Israeli officials say they haven’t yet made an official decision to expand military operations against Hezbollah – and haven’t said publicly what those operations might be. Last week, though, the head of Israel’s Northern Command was quoted in local media as advocating for a ground invasion of Lebanon.
Meanwhile, as fighting in Gaza has slowed, Israel has increased its forces along the Lebanese border, including the arrival of a powerful army division believed to include thousands of troops.
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant last week declared the start of a “new phase” of the war as Israel turns its focus toward Hezbollah.
“The center of gravity is shifting to the north,” he said.
A UN-brokered truce to the 2006 war called on Hezbollah to pull back 29 kilometers (18 miles) from the border, but it has refused, accusing Israel of also failing to carry out some provisions. Israel is now demanding Hezbollah withdraw eight to 10 kilometers (five to six miles) from the border – the range of Hezbollah’s anti-tank guided missiles.
The monthlong 2006 war, triggered when Hezbollah fighters kidnapped two Israeli soldiers, included heavy Israeli bombardment of southern Lebanon and Beirut and a ground invasion into the south. The strategy, Israeli commanders later said, was to inflict maximum damage in areas where Hezbollah operated to deter them from launching attacks.
But Israel could have a more ambitious goal this time: to seize a buffer zone in south Lebanon to push back Hezbollah fighters from the border. A fight to hold territory threatens a longer, even more destructive and destabilizing war – recalling Israel’s 1982-2000 occupation of southern Lebanon.
What would be the impact of a full-blown war? The fear is that a new war could be even worse than the one in 2006, which was traumatic enough for both sides to serve as a deterrent ever since.
The fighting then killed hundreds of Hezbollah fighters and an estimated 1,100 Lebanese civilians and left large swaths of the south and even parts of Beirut in ruins. More than 120 Israeli soldiers were killed and hundreds wounded. Hezbollah missile fire on Israeli cities killed dozens of civilians.
Israel estimates that Hezbollah now possesses about 150,000 rockets and missiles, some of which are precision-guided, putting the entire country within range. Israel has beefed up air defenses, but it’s unclear whether it can defend against the intense barrages of a new war.
Israel has vowed it could turn all of southern Lebanon into a battle zone, saying Hezbollah has embedded rockets, weapons and forces along the border. And in the heightened rhetoric of the past months, Israeli politicians have spoken of inflicting the same damage in Lebanon that the military has wreaked in Gaza.

Major companies in the arms industry saw a 4.2% increase in overall revenue in 2023 with sharp rises for producers based in Russia and the Middle East, a new report said Monday.

The report by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, or SIPRI, said revenues from the top 100 arms companies totaled $632 billion last year in response to surging demand related to the wars in Ukraine and Gaza.

It said that “smaller producers were more efficient at responding to new demand."

By contrast, some major companies such as US-based Lockheed Martin Corp. and RTX that were involved in complex, long-term contacts registered a drop in earnings, according to The AP.

The 41 US-based arms companies among the world's top 100 saw revenues of $317 billion, a 2.5% increase from 2022, the report said.

Since 2018, the world's top five companies in the industry are Lockheed Martin Corp., RTX, Northrop Grumman Corp., Boeing and General Dynamics Corp.

Six arms companies based in the Middle East and in the world's top 100 saw their combined revenues grow by 18%, to a total of $19.6 billion.

“With the outbreak of war in Gaza, the arms revenues of the three companies based in Israel in the top 100 reached $13.6 billion,” the highest figure ever recorded by Israeli companies in the SIPRI reports, the institute said.

The slowest revenue growth in 2023 was in the European arms industry, excluding Russia. Revenue totaled $133 billion or 0.2% more than in 2022, as most producers were working on older, long-term contracts.

But smaller companies in Europe were able to quickly tap into the demand related to Russia's war against Ukraine.

Russia's top two arms companies saw their combined revenues increase by 40%, to an estimated $25.5 billion.

“This was almost entirely due to the 49% increase in arms revenues recorded by Rostec, a state-owned holding company controlling many arms producers,” the SIPRI report said.

What to Know about the Growing Conflict between Israel and Lebanon's Hezbollah