Huge explosions shook Beirut as Israel said it struck Hezbollah’s headquarters

The Israeli-Hezbollah Campaign During the 2006-2007 War in Dahiyeh: The Case for a Second Israel War in Lebanon

Israel increased its attacks on Hezbollah in Lebanon this week in order to put an end to Hezbollah’s attacks. The scope of Israel’s operation remains unclear, but officials have said a ground invasion to push the militant group away from the border is a possibility. Thousands of Israeli troops have been moved toward the border.

The strike in the Beirut suburb of Dahiyeh came shortly after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addressed the U.N., vowing that Israel’s campaign against Hezbollah would continue. Not long before the explosion, thousands were massed in the suburb for the funeral of three Hezbollah members, including a senior commander, killed in earlier strikes.

At the UN, Netanyahu said that he would continue degrading Hezbollah until Israel achieved its goals.

That has Lebanese fearing a repeat of the last Israel-Hezbollah war, in 2006, which lasted a month and caused heavy destruction over parts of their country. Or worse, they fear, Lebanon could suffer devastation on the scale caused in Gaza by Israel’s nearly yearlong campaign against Hamas.

The health ministry of Lebanon announced late Friday that six people had died and more than 90 had been injured by the strikes, but they said they were still clearing vast quantities of rubble.

Netanyahu meets with Danon: Israel’s UN ambassador to the United Nations and calls for a cease-fire at the U.N., as Israel strikes Lebanon

The Israeli premier met with his Dutch counterpart during one of several meetings in New York this week, and raised the proceedings currently underway at the court. Netanyahu insisted during the bilateral conversation that the prosecutor’s actions, which were based on false libels, were a political proceeding that jeopardized every democracy defending itself against terrorism.

As the Israeli military calls up further reserves close to the northern border and responds to Hezbollah rocket fire with dozens of airstrikes in Lebanon, Netanyahu also remains at the center of a high-profile demand for an arrest warrant against him, issued by the chief prosecutor at the International Criminal Court, which is based in The Hague, Netherlands.

The government wants certain terms in any deal, said Danny Danon, Israel’s UN ambassador. He made a statement outside the U.N. Security Council on Friday. “The goal is to allow the citizens of Israel, 70,000 refugees to return to their homes.” It was to push Hezbollah from the south Lebanon area.

But nearly a year into Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza, the Israeli leader’s behavior during many months of on-again-off-again cease-fire negotiations has not only infuriated his political opponents and a sizable chunk of his own citizens, but has confounded many world leaders too.

Critics have often in recent months said that Netanyahu — whose political savvy has helped him survive repeatedly to become Israel’s longest-serving prime minister in history — will agree to show negotiating flexibility during private meetings, before issuing public statements that block progress during peace talks.

He said that he would come to New York and “set the record straight” because his arrival had been slightly delayed due to domestic considerations.

Source: Netanyahu defies calls for a cease-fire at the U.N., as Israel strikes Lebanon

Hezbollah, Israel, and the U.N.: Israeli War Crimes in the Gaza Strip, the United Nations General Assembly, and Lebanon

Abbas told the delegates that Israel does not deserve to be a member of the UN. The international community has condemned the war crimes committed by Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Israel has denied committing genocide or other war crimes, arguing that it is fighting to defeat militant groups and defend itself from further attacks.

For days, Arab leaders including Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas had been assailing the behavior of the Israeli military in Gaza, the occupied West Bank and Lebanon.

Many of the delegates in the U.N. hall stood up and swiftly left in a public snub at the start of his address — in which he called the U.N. a “swamp of antisemitic bile.”

In a fiery speech at the United Nations General Assembly in New York Friday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said his country is “winning” on multiple fronts and would attack Iran and its proxies anywhere in the Middle East, even as Israeli air force jets were preparing to pound a complex of buildings in central Beirut that Israel says serve as a headquarters for the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah.

The scope of Israel’s operation remains unclear, but officials have said a ground invasion to push the militant group away from the border is a possibility. Israel moved thousands of troops toward the border in preparation.

The United Nations said the fighting has left 211,000 people homeless, including 85,000 who are currently in public schools. Airstrikes have forced 20 primary health care centers to shut down and disrupted access to clean water for nearly 300,000 people.

Israeli army spokesperson Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said the strikes targeted the main Hezbollah headquarters, saying it was located underground beneath residential buildings.

Israel did not comment on the type of bomb or how many it used but the explosion leveled more than a city block. The Israeli army has used American-made bombs to hit subterranean targets.

Footage showed rescue workers clambering over large slabs of concrete, surrounded by high piles of twisted metal and wreckage. One crater was visible when a car fell into it. A stream of residents carrying their belongings were seen fleeing along a main road out of the district.

The national news agency in Lebanon stated that a number of apartment towers in Haret Hreik were reduced to rubble by the series of blasts. A wall of billowing black and orange smoke rose into the sky as windows were rattled and houses shaken some 30 kilometers (20 miles) north of Beirut.

News of the blasts came as Netanyahu was briefing reporters after his U.N. address. Netanyahu abruptly ended the briefings after the military aide whispered into his ear.

Hezbollah will not tolerate humiliation, as announced by a top official in the Gazan army in the aftermath of the September 11 rocket attack

The death toll is likely to rise significantly as teams comb through the rubble of six buildings. Following the initial blast, Israel launched a series of strikes on other areas of the south.

The health ministry in Lebanon said six people were killed and at least 91 were wounded. It was the largest bomb to hit the capital of Lebanon in the past year, and was likely to push the conflict closer to war.

Hussein Fadlallah, Hezbollah’s top official in Beirut, said in a speech that no matter how many commanders Israel kills, the group has endless numbers of experienced fighters. Hezbollah will continue to fight until Israel stops its offensive in Gaza.

People in the giant crowd waved their fists in the air and chanted, “We will never accept humiliation,” as they marched marched behind the three coffins, wrapped in the group’s yellow flag.

Hezbollah officials and their supporters remain defiant. Not long before the explosions Friday evening, thousands gathered in another part of Beirut’s suburbs for the funeral of three Hezbollah members killed in earlier strikes, including the head of the group’s drone unit, Mohammed Surour.

The bodies of Hiba Ataya and her mom Sabah Olyan were found in the rubble of a building that was destroyed by a strike.

In Gaza, Israel aims to dismantle Hamas’ military and political regime, but the goal in Lebanon is to push Hezbollah away from the border — “not a high bar like Gaza” in terms of operational objectives, said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity due to military briefing guidelines.

In a post on the social media platform X, the Israeli military wrote that Nasrallah would “no longer be able to terrorize the world,” prompting loud music to ring out across Tel Aviv in celebration of his death.

Nasrallah only very rarely made public appearances during his 32-year tenure atop a group that several nations, including the United States, have labeled a terrorist organization.

The announcement Saturday of Hezbollah’s leader added that the group’s senior military commander for the region close to Lebanon’s border with Israel was also killed. This would effectively mean much of Hezbollah’s command structure had been taken out by Israeli attacks in the past two months, as tit-for-tat rocket, artillery, tank and aircraft missiles continued across the border.

Israel’s top military commander, Chief of the General Staff Lieutenant General Herzi Halevi, issued a video statement Saturday, in which he said the unprecedented strikes Friday that had targeted Hezbollah’s leadership was “not the end” for what he termed Israel’s “toolbox.’