News Mania Desk/ Piyal Chatterjee / 9th October 2024
Hezbollah’s deputy commander declared on Tuesday that the Iran-backed organization has progressed past the “painful blows” dealt by Israel, as the Israeli military started conducting ground operations in the southwest of Lebanon, extending its incursions into a new territory.
Hezbollah would not cry first, according to Naim Qassem, who described the struggle between Hezbollah and Israel as a war about who will cry first. After a year of fighting, he claimed its capabilities have not diminished. The assault on southern Israel by the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas a year ago set off a chain of events in the region that included many Israeli air and ground operations over Lebanon and direct Iranian attacks on Israeli military installations.
A week after Tehran launched a flurry of missiles at the Islamic Republic, raising tensions in the Middle East, Iran forewarned Israel on Tuesday against any assaults on the country. Any attack on Iran’s infrastructure would be met with retribution, Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said, warning Israel against attacks on his country.
Beginning on Tuesday, Araqchi will go to Saudi Arabia and other Middle Eastern nations to talk about regional concerns and try to put an end to Israel’s “crimes” in Gaza and Lebanon, according to a report from Iran’s ISNA news agency.
Gulf Arab states – most of them big oil exporters like Iran – have sought to reassure Tehran of their neutrality in the Iran-Israel confrontation, sources told the media last week.
“Our dialogue continues in regards to the developments in the region to prevent the shameless crimes of the Zionist regime (Israel) in Lebanon in continuation of the crimes in Gaza,” Araqchi said in a video carried by state media.
“Starting today I’ll start a trip to the region, to Riyadh and other capitals in the region and we will strive to have a collective movement from the countries of the region… to stop the brutal attacks in Lebanon.”
The Israeli military increased the pressure on Hezbollah, which is supported by Iran in Lebanon, by declaring that it was carrying out “limited, localized, targeted operations” in the southwest of the country after previously announcing such operations for the southeast border region. An Israeli military strike in the southern suburbs of Beirut overnight claimed the life of a top Hezbollah official in charge of the organization’s finances and logistics. Suhail Hussein Husseini’s killing, if verified, would be the most recent in a run of Israeli assassinations of Hezbollah and Hamas commanders.
Suhail Hussein Husseini’s killing, if verified, would be the most recent in a run of Israeli assassinations of Hezbollah and Hamas commanders.
Israel murdered Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah with an airstrike in the southern suburbs of Beirut late last month, dealing the organization its worst blow in decades.
Josep Borrell, the head of EU foreign policy, told the European Parliament on Tuesday that the situation in Lebanon is becoming worse by the day and that a ceasefire is needed.
