Israeli strike in Hodeida, Yemen: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu meets with Prime Minister Joe Biden on a U.S. Air Force Base
Netanyahu was arriving at Ben Gurion airport when the missile attack was launched. The media office for the Iran-backed rebels in Yemen said that Israel struck at the ports and power plants in Hodeida city. The Houthi-run Health Ministry said the strikes killed four people and wounded 40 others.
On Saturday, the Houthis, the main military group in Yemen, launched a ballistic missile toward central Israel, saying it was targeting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s airplane returning from addressing the United Nations General Assembly in New York.
In support of Hamas, Hezbollah says it will continue firing rockets into northern Israel until there’s a cease-fire in Israel’s military campaign in Gaza.
There was still a lot of smoldering debris from Friday’s strike. Smoke rose over the rubble as people flocked to the site, some to check on what was left of their homes and others to pay respects, pray or simply to see the destruction.
President Joe Biden believes that a war in the Middle East cannot be avoided and will speak with Benjamin Netanyahu soon. When Biden went to the Air Force base in Delaware, he told reporters that it had to be.
Hezbollah vs. Israel: a devastating clash between the Sunni and the Sidon militant groups in the United States and Lebanon
In a video of a strike in Sidon, a building swayed before collapsing as neighbors filmed. One TV station called on viewers to pray for a family trapped under the rubble, as rescuers failed to reach them. The Lebanese Health Ministry reported at least 14 medics were killed over two days in the south.
105 people were killed in the country when planes bombed it Sunday, the Health Ministry said. The ministry said two strikes near the southern city of Sidon killed at least 32 people. Separately, Israeli strikes in the northern province of Baalbek Hermel killed 21 people and wounded at least 47.
An official with Lebanon’s Civil Defense had earlier said that a member of the al-Jamaa al-Islamiya was killed in the strike and that 16 other people were wounded, but the Sunni militant group, which fights alongside Hezbollah, has not confirmed the death of any of its members.
The Israeli military closed the area near the border with Lebanon. The U.N. says one million people have been displaced in Lebanon due to the fighting between Hezbollah and Israel.
Kaouk was a veteran member of Hezbollah going back to the 1980s and served as Hezbollah’s military commander in southern Lebanon during the 2006 war with Israel. In 2020, the United States imposed sanctions on him.
The Hezbollah militant group was backed by Iran and fought a devastating war with Israel in 2006 that ended in a draw.
The Al-Buss Refugee Camp: Israel Kills a Soldier in Lebanon, a White House spokesman tells Associated Press
Hundreds of thousands of people have been driven from their homes. The government estimates around half a million people are in shelters, with three to four times as many staying with family and friends.
Kirby dodged questions about whether the Biden administration agrees with how Israel is targeting Hezbollah leaders on “State of the Union.” The White House continues to call on Israel and Hezbollah to agree to a 21-day temporary cease-fire floated by the U.S., France and other countries during the U.N. General Assembly last week.
Kirby thinks people are safer without Nasrallah around. “But they will try to recover. We’re watching to see what they do to try to fill this leadership vacuum. It is going to be difficult. … Much of their command structure has now been wiped out.”
White House spokesman John Kirby said Israel’s airstrikes in Lebanon wiped out Hezbollah’s command structure but the group will work quickly to rebuild it.
A commander with the militant group Hamas, which has a presence in Lebanon’s Palestinian refugee camps, was killed in an early Monday strike. Hamas said that the Al-Buss refugee camp was attacked with an air strike, and that the leader of the camp, Abbas, and his family were killed.
Three Palestinians were killed in an airstrike, according to a Palestinian group. The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine said in a statement early Monday that its military and security commanders in Lebanon, and a third member, were killed in the attack.
The airstrike hit a multistory residential building, according to an Associated Press journalist at the scene. Videos showed ambulances and a crowd gathered near the building in a mainly Sunni district with a busy thoroughfare lined with shops.
Israeli air strikes against Hezbollah: a warning to Israel about the possibility of a ground invasion, a military intelligence official told NPR
An official told NPR that Israel had begun to conduct brief intelligence-gathering raids in southern Lebanon this week, as it prepared for a limited ground offensive.
“Everything is on the table,” the official in the region said about a possibility of a ground incursion. The U.S. official and the official in the Middle East spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the operation.
Tamir Hayman, who served as the head of Israel’s military intelligence directorate until 2021, said in an interview on Israeli Army Radio on Monday that Israel’s airstrikes in Lebanon had successfully knocked Hezbollah off balance.
Lloyd Austin spoke to the defense minister of Israel about the consequences if Iran launched a strike against Israel. The United States is concerned about Iran-backed groups in Iraq and Syria and the conflict between Israel and Iran. Defense Secretary Austin said the U.S. supports Israel dismantling Hezbollah infrastructure in Lebanon so that they can’t threaten Israeli border towns. He urged Israel to change course and focus on diplomacy.
A White House official told NPR the U.S. supports the incursion but is warning Israel about “mission creep.” The Israeli ambassador to the U.S. told Israeli public radio the U.S. has not restricted the duration of Israel’s incursion but that it is concerned about a regional escalation.
Immediately after Netanyahu arrived in Israel, air raid sirens were heard throughout central Israel. The missile was shot down by the Israeli military.
Benjamin Netanyahu said there was no Middle East Israel could not reach, and that Iran supported Hezbollah and Hamas.
The army of Lebanon moved back to their bases at the border with Israel due to the bombardment by Israeli forces. A Lebanese army official who spoke to NPR said this was a re-position of positions that were vulnerable to an Israeli incursion.
On Monday, Hezbollah’s deputy leader, Naim Kassem, said in a television address that the resistance forces are ready for a ground engagement. Hezbollah leaders and members were attacked by Israel in recent weeks.
“We definitely keep saying violence cannot stop violence. We need diplomatic efforts to stop the violence. Lebanon doesn’t want to become another Gaza.
“This is not an incursion, this is an invasion,” Najat Aoun Saliba, a Lebanese member of parliament, told NPR. “We’ve been invaded by another country and we have to call on the international community to call it as such.”
The conflict entered a new phase over the weekend, after the killing of Hezbollah’s leader and several other top officials by Israel.
An Israeli Prime Minister’s Call for Prohibition of Israeli Cross–Integer Attacks in Lebanese Territories
Riza called on the global community to help ensure protection of civilians as violence escalates. “Without sufficient resources, humanitarians risk leaving the population of an entire country without the support they urgently require.”
According to Lebanon’s acting prime minister, Mikati, his country was facing one of the most dangerous periods of its history and urged the UN to provide emergency funding for civilians impacted by the conflict.
Lebanese politicians urgently called on the international community to pressure Israel to stop its advance into Lebanese territory on Tuesday, as Israeli troops crossed into southern Lebanon in an operation targeting Hezbollah outposts.