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UN Warns against 'Catastrophic' Regional Conflict

An armed ultra-Orthodox Jewish man holds a child by the hand as he walks in the Old City in Jerusalem at the start of the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur -AFP
An armed ultra-Orthodox Jewish man holds a child by the hand as he walks in the Old City in Jerusalem at the start of the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur -AFP
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UN Warns against 'Catastrophic' Regional Conflict

An armed ultra-Orthodox Jewish man holds a child by the hand as he walks in the Old City in Jerusalem at the start of the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur -AFP
An armed ultra-Orthodox Jewish man holds a child by the hand as he walks in the Old City in Jerusalem at the start of the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur -AFP

UN peacekeepers in Lebanon warned Saturday against a "catastrophic" regional conflict as Israeli forces battled Hezbollah and Hamas fighters on two fronts, on the holiest day of the Jewish calendar.

Israel has faced a fierce diplomatic backlash over incidents in south Lebanon that saw five Blue Helmets wounded.

On Saturday, the Lebanese health ministry said Israeli airstrikes on two villages located near the capital Beirut killed nine people.

Israel had earlier told residents of south Lebanon not to return home, as its troops launched a war on the country that has killed more than 1,200 people since September 23, and forced more than a million others to flee their homes.

"For your own protection, do not return to your homes until further notice... Do not go south; anyone who goes south may put his life at risk," Israeli military spokesman Avichay Adraee posted on X.

Hezbollah said Saturday it launched missiles across the border into northern Israel, where air raid sirens sounded and the military said it had intercepted a projectile.

In an interview with AFP, UNIFIL spokesman Andrea Tenenti told AFP he feared an Israeli escalation against Hezbollah in south Lebanon could soon spiral out of control "into a regional conflict with catastrophic impact for everyone".

The UN force said five peacekeepers have been wounded by fighting in south Lebanon in just two days, and Tenenti said "a lot of damage" had been caused to its posts there.

Around Israel, markets were closed and public transport halted as observant Jews fasted and prayed on Yom Kippur.

After the holiday, attention is likely to turn again to Israel's expected retaliation against Iran, which launched around 200 missiles at Israel on October 1.

Israel began pounding Gaza shortly after suffering its worst ever attacks from Hamas on October 7 last year, and it launched a ground offensive on Lebanon claiming targets against Hezbollah on September 30.

 

- 'Deliberately targeted' -

 

On Friday, Israel faced criticism from the UN, its Western allies and others over what it said was a "hit" on a UN peacekeeping position in Lebanon.

Two Sri Lankan peacekeepers were hurt in the second such incident in two days, UNIFIL said Friday.

Israel's military said soldiers had responded to "an immediate threat" around 50 metres (yards) from the UNIFIL base in Naqura, and has pledged to carry out a "thorough review".

The Irish military's chief of staff, Sean Clancy, said it was "not an accidental act", and French President Emmanuel Macron said he believed the peacekeepers had been "deliberately targeted".

Both countries are major contributors to UNIFIL whose peacekeepers are on the front line of the Israel-Hezbollah war.

Efforts to negotiate an end to the fighting have so far failed, but Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati said his government would ask the UN Security Council to issue a new resolution calling for a "full and immediate ceasefire".

Lebanon's military said Friday an Israeli strike on one of its positions in south Lebanon killed two soldiers.

In a show of support for Iran's ally Hezbollah, the speaker of the Iranian parliament Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf visited the site Saturday of a deadly Israeli strike earlier this week.

A source close to Hezbollah said the strike had targeted Hezbollah's security chief Wafiq Safa, but neither Hezbollah nor Israel has confirmed he was the target.

Ghalibaf's Lebanon visit, a signal of Tehran's defiance, comes after Israel vowed to respond to Iran's second-ever direct attack.

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant has vowed that the response will be "deadly, precise and surprising".

The United States is pushing for a "proportionate" response that would not tip the region into a wider war, with President Joe Biden urging Israel to avoid striking Iranian nuclear facilities or energy infrastructure.

 

- Gaza deaths -

 

Israeli operations in Gaza continue, with the army laying siege to an area around Jabalia in the north, causing more suffering for hundreds of thousands of people trapped there, according to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees.

Adraee, the Israeli military spokesman, posted another evacuation warning Saturday for an area near Jabalia.

"The specified area, including the shelters within it, is considered a dangerous combat zone," Adraee said on X, ordering residents to move to the humanitarian zone in southern Gaza.

Some residents said they were not prepared to do so.

"They tell us to go south, but we won't go because of the dangers and the army is shooting at people there," 27-year-old Sami Asliya told AFP.

"There is no safe place, neither in the south nor in the north -- everyone is at risk of death," he said.

On Friday, Gaza's civil defense agency reported 30 people killed in Israeli strikes in the area, including on schools being used as shelter by displaced people.

An AFP journalist in Gaza reported heavy shelling, explosions and gunfire Saturday further south in Gaza City's Zeitoun neighbourhood.

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What to Know about Israel's Ground Invasion in Southern Lebanon

A picture taken from northern Israel along the border with southern Lebanon shows smoke billowing above south Lebanon during Israeli bombardment on October 4, 2024. (Photo by Jalaa MAREY / AFP)
A picture taken from northern Israel along the border with southern Lebanon shows smoke billowing above south Lebanon during Israeli bombardment on October 4, 2024. (Photo by Jalaa MAREY / AFP)
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What to Know about Israel's Ground Invasion in Southern Lebanon

A picture taken from northern Israel along the border with southern Lebanon shows smoke billowing above south Lebanon during Israeli bombardment on October 4, 2024. (Photo by Jalaa MAREY / AFP)
A picture taken from northern Israel along the border with southern Lebanon shows smoke billowing above south Lebanon during Israeli bombardment on October 4, 2024. (Photo by Jalaa MAREY / AFP)

Israel’s ground invasion in Lebanon stretched into its second week, as the Hezbollah militant group fired hundreds of rockets deep into Israel — with no end in sight to the escalating conflict.
More than 1,400 people have been killed in Lebanon — mostly in airstrikes — and over a million displaced since the fighting intensified in mid-September. At least 15 Israeli soldiers and two civilians have been killed since the ground operation began, and more than 60,000 people have been displaced from towns along the border for more than a year.
Hezbollah began firing rockets into Israel on Oct. 8, 2023, a day after Hamas, the Palestinian militant group, attacked southern Israel, which sparked the war in Gaza. Israel and Hezbollah have exchanged fire almost every day since, coming close to a full-fledged war on several occasions but stepping back from the brink until this month, The Associated Press said.
Here’s what to know about the current ground incursion in southern Lebanon:
What is the aim of the Israeli military’s ground invasion? The Israeli military began what they called a “limited, localized and targeted ground raids” in southern Lebanon on Oct. 1. The same day, the military said that it had carried out dozens of secretive cross-border operations to destroy Hezbollah infrastructure over the past year. The aim, Israel says, is to allow its displaced residents to return home.
A military official said that thousands of Israeli troops are currently operating along the roughly 100-kilometer-long (62-mile) border, clearing the area just along the border to try to remove the launch pads where Hezbollah fires rocket-propelled grenades and anti-tank missiles into Israeli towns, as well as infrastructure they say would allow for an Oct. 7-style invasion of Israel.
The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the military’s strategy, said the troops haven’t ventured deep inside Lebanon so far, and have conducted operations from distances of a few hundred meters (yards) up to 2 to 3 kilometers (1.5 to 2 miles) into Lebanese territory.
The Israeli military has shared videos of what it says are underground tunnels chiseled into rock used by Hezbollah. The tunnels are used to store weapons and stage attacks. One tunnel stretched from Lebanon into Israeli territory, according to the military.
The goal is not to destroy Hezbollah, and the army is aware that this will not remove the threat of longer-range rockets and missiles, the official said.
Elijah Magnier, a Brussels-based military and counterterrorism analyst, said Israeli forces haven’t seized any ground positions yet.
“They need to go in, harass, test and come out,” Magnier said. In order to hold ground positions, Israel would need tanks to come in and take high critical ground overlooking territory, he said. He estimates it would require clearing some 10 kilometers of Hezbollah presence, which is still a long way off.
It is not clear how long the operation will last or how long Israel will maintain a presence in these towns. The official said the hope is that this can lead to a diplomatic arrangement pushing Hezbollah away from the border. But the plans could change. A previous Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982, initially intended to push back Palestinian militants, turned into an 18-year occupation.
What is Hezbollah’s strategy? Hezbollah officials, including assassinated leader Hassan Nasrallah, have conceded that the Israeli military has the superior air force and intelligence. But Hezbollah has the advantage in direct confrontations on Lebanese turf.
Hezbollah forces have better equipment and training compared to Hamas, which Israel has been battling for more than a year in Gaza. Hezbollah forces gained experience in wars in Syria and Iraq. Lebanon’s terrain is also more rugged and challenging than the Palestinian enclave, which is mostly flat and sandy.
Hezbollah’s strategy, led by its elite Radwan Forces, has been drawing in and ambushing incoming Israeli troops, detonating explosive devices or firing rockets at them, and firing artillery and rockets at Israeli border towns. Although Hezbollah has lost many of its top officials and commanders in recent weeks, militants have continued to fire rockets deeper into Israel, including heavy barrages on the city of Haifa.
Former Lebanese Army General Hassan Jouni said that he assessed Israel is still conducting reconnaissance ahead of its main attack, but that it had already suffered heavy losses in the smaller operations. Jouni said Hezbollah had dug many tunnels in the south and were well equipped with weapons caches and ammunition.
“The land always works in the favor of those who own it,” he said.
How does this compare to the 2006 war between Israel and Hezbollah? Israel and Hezbollah last went to war in 2006, a 34-day conflict that ended with the United Nations Resolution 1701, which was supposed to push Hezbollah further north and keep the border region exclusively under the control of the Lebanese army and UN peacekeepers.
Israeli leaders say they want Lebanon to implement the resolution. Hezbollah says Israel hasn’t held up its part of the treaty and will stop firing rockets when there is a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip.
Israel’s searing air campaign in southern Lebanon and Beirut in recent weeks is similar to the 2006 war, though this time, better intelligence has enabled Israel to kill several of Hezbollah’s top leadership.
“The Air Force is better and is using all kinds of methods to penetrate deeper into the ground, like dropping bomb after bomb after bomb,” said Yoel Guzansky, a senior researcher at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv. Israel killed Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in September by dropping more than 80 bombs on an apartment complex built over an underground compound in quick succession.
In the 2006 war, Israel sent ground troops into Lebanon after 10 days of airstrikes before withdrawing them about four weeks later. Troops attempted to reach the Litani River, about 30 kilometers (18.5 miles) north of the border, but suffered heavy losses before a ceasefire ended the operation and the war.
Could there be a diplomatic solution? Hezbollah’s acting leader signaled Tuesday that the group is open to a cease-fire. Guzansky believes Israeli troops will stay on the ground in southern Lebanon until there is an internationally enforced diplomatic solution that’s stronger than the current UN peacekeeping force. If Israeli troops retreat, he said, they risk the same situation as 2006, where Hezbollah simply rearmed and resumed operations.
But former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who was Israel’s leader during the 2006 war, said that war served as a lesson that immediate diplomacy, rather than military force, is the only way to keep the border quiet.
“Why not try and make a deal now rather than to fight for half a year?” he asked in an interview with The Associated Press. “You lose how many soldiers, kill how many innocent people? And then in the end we’ll make a deal which may have been made in advance.”