(OPINION) Even though a lot of people out there don’t seem to realize it yet, we are watching history in the making. Israel and Hezbollah have both been preparing for a final showdown for many years, and now here we are.
I have a feeling that both sides have more surprises up their sleeves, and in the months ahead we are going to witness things that we have never seen before.
Of course we have never seen thousands of pagers and walkie-talkies suddenly explode before either. During a speech that was delivered on Thursday, Hezbollah’s leader Hassan Nasrallah publicly declared that “all red lines have been crossed by the enemy”…
Hezbollah’s leader has condemned Israel after thousands of pagers and walkie talkies exploded over two days, saying ‘all red lines have been crossed by the enemy’ and that the deadly attacks ‘deserve a response’.
Nasrallah also said that what we witnessed this week was a “declaration of war” by Israel…
Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah declared Israel’s surprise pager and handheld radio attacks a “declaration of war” and dared the Jewish state to invade Lebanon. As he spoke, Israeli forces carpet bombed the terror group’s strongholds.
In a televised address Thursday, Nasrallah acknowledged that Hezbollah “received a heavy, painful blow,” saying that Israel’s decision to detonate scores of pagers and other electronic devices earlier this week amounted to “a major aggression” that will not go unanswered.
“These massacres amount to war crimes or a declaration of war,” Nasrallah said, promising “a crushing response from the axis of resistance.”
It sounds like he is saying that Israel and Hezbollah are now officially at war.
And of course that would be an accurate assessment of the current state of affairs.
As Nasrallah was delivering his speech, Israeli forces were conducting airstrikes in southern Lebanon, and fighter jets were setting off sonic booms over Beirut…
Israel launched a wave of airstrikes against Hezbollah targets in southern Lebanon, moments before the militant group’s leader said two days of debilitating attacks on its members amounted to a declaration of war.
The strikes Thursday were more extensive than in previous days and were timed to coincide with a televised speech by Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, who was addressing a wave of device explosions before cadres who were shocked by the scale of the attack. Israeli jets flew over Beirut, setting off sonic booms as they have done repeatedly in recent months in an effort to intimidate the group.
Does Nasrallah actually believe that Hezbollah can win the coming war?
He must realize that Israel has capabilities that his side does not.
Once Israeli forces enter southern Lebanon, there will be no turning back and vast numbers of people will die.
At this moment, additional Israeli units are on their way to the northern border…
In a statement Wednesday, Israel’s Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said the “center of gravity” in the Israel-Hamas war was moving north to Lebanon. He said more military units and resources were being sent to the border.
“This is not Hamas − we’re dealing with something different, and we need to prepare accordingly,” he said.
I know that the Biden administration is still pushing for peace, but U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and his minions are extremely incompetent.
And Hezbollah has already stated that there will be no peace as long as the IDF is fighting in Gaza. On Thursday, Hezbollah continued to fire at targets inside northern Israel…
The powerful Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah continued to strike what it called military targets in northern Israel Thursday after thousands of its members were injured and several killed in an apparent Israeli operation using exploding pagers and other communication devices. The Israel Defense Forces said it was striking Hezbollah targets in Lebanon “to degrade Hezbollah’s terrorist capabilities and infrastructure.”
“The Hezbollah terrorist organization has turned southern Lebanon into a combat zone. For decades, Hezbollah has weaponized civilian homes, dug tunnels beneath them, and used civilians as human shields,” the IDF said in a statement.
“The IDF is operating to bring security to northern Israel in order to enable the return of residents to their homes, as well as to achieve of all of the war goals.”
In response, the IDF hit more than 100 Hezbollah rocket launchers. The airstrikes that we witnessed on Thursday evening are being called “some of the most intense” that we have seen so far…
Israel carried out dozens of strikes on Thursday across southern Lebanon, in what Lebanese security sources said were some of the most intense bombings since Hezbollah began daily cross-border attacks on northern communities after the start of the Gaza war on October 7.
The military said fighter jets had struck over 100 Hezbollah rocket launchers in southern Lebanon that were primed for immediate attacks on Israel. It said that in total, the launchers included around 1,000 launch barrels.
This is going to end very badly. But most you knew that already. There are a couple of other things that I wanted to mention.
Firstly, it is being reported that the pagers and walkie-talkies that exploded this week were actually made by shell companies that had been set up by the Israelis…
The Israeli secret service didn’t just tamper with the deadly Hezbollah pagers — they made them from scratch, having set up a complex web of shell companies across Europe, it was claimed today.
Initially it was suspected that Mossad had managed to intercept and plant tiny bombs in a shipment of the pagers headed for the Iranian-backed terror group in Lebanon after thousands of people were injured and dozens killed.
But now it appears that the Israelis set up front companies across Europe to manufacture the pagers themselves, embedding small amounts of PETN explosive inside, ready to be detonated by a coded message.
In particular, the New York Times is telling us that the pagers that exploded came from a Hungarian company that had been purposely set up to sell electronic equipment to Hezbollah…
A report Thursday alleged that a Hungarian firm that apparently supplied pagers used by Hezbollah was secretly set up by Israeli spies as part of a widescale operation that appeared to culminate this week when the devices exploded, killing several and maiming thousands of Hezbollah operatives and others in Lebanon and Syria.
The New York Times claimed that rather than merely managing to tamper with the devices at some stage of their production or distribution, Israel actually “manufactured them as part of an elaborate ruse.”
On the other side, the Iranians have apparently been attempting to assassinate Benjamin Netanyahu and other top Israeli officials…
Iran plotted to assassinate Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, and Shin Bet Director Ronen Bar, the Shin Bet, in cooperation with the police, announced on Thursday.
Its efforts were particularly intense following the assassination of Hamas political chief Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran on July 31, which most of the world has attributed to Mossad. However, Israel has been careful not to take any credit for it.
In addition, the Islamic Republic, at a somewhat more vague level, explored assassinating former prime minister Naftali Bennett and other top Israeli defense officials. (READ MORE)
