Today’s Image
With apologies to Rod Serling, host of the very popular TV show The Twilight Zone. “Imagine that you are just driving down the road minding your own business and thinking about just having a nice dinner with your family. But then, POW!! You hear sirens then pull you car off the road to stop and take cover. Then see an explosion resulting from a rocket striking the road exactly where you would have been if you didn’t stop. Stop, don’t panic… you are entering the HEZBOLLAH ZONE.” Watch this video!!
Casualties
There were no casualties reported by the IDF in the last 3 days.
Rockets & Missiles & Drones
No rockets launched from Gaza crossed into Israeli air space in the past 8 days.
Altogether Hezbollah launched more than 300 rockets into Israel over the past 24 hours. So far the only injuries resulted from anxiety, shock or people getting hurt while taking cover. One rocket made a direct hit on a home in the northern Israeli town of Rosh Pina. The rocket punched a clean hole into their roof. But all the residents came out unharmed as all were inside their Mamad, bomb shelter room. One ambulance operating in the Jezreel Valley in northern Israel was damaged by shrapnel falling as a result of a neutralized rocket. Most of these rockets were intercepted, but always a few get through. If Iron Dome can see that the trajectory leads to the rocket falling in the sea or an open field, it does not intercept.
Rockets also reined down on the northern Israeli towns of Nazareth and Afula. Nazareth is a largely Arab Muslim town. Kiryat Shmona, the largest Israeli city in the north, was hit very hard throughout the night. No injuries, but a few buildings were damaged with fires after getting hit. In less than 10 minutes a barrage of 50 rockets struck. Altogether more than 80 rockets were fired by Hezbollah this morning.
This evening, Hezbollah launched 3 kamikaze drones targeting the northern city of Haifa. All were neutralized. Then Hezbollah claimed to have launched 3 drones at the Israel Special Forces naval base on the Mediterranean coast, south of Haifa. The IDF said that 2 of the drones were intercepted and the third fell on a nearby town of Atlit. Atlit has one of the most beautiful beaches on the Mediterranean. There was minor damage to a building, a fire broke out and was immediately extinguished. There were no injuries reported.
This afternoon, on Israeli TV Station 12, an Israeli official reported that by IDF estimates, Hezbollah’s rocket supply has been severely depleted in the past few days with the waves of Israeli fighter jet strikes. According to this official it is estimated that about ½ of the precision missiles in Hezbollah’s possession have been destroyed and ¾ of the rockets having a range greater than 40 km. This was not an official statement from the IDF and I don’t buy it. Hezbollah had more than 150,000 rockets and missiles in its arsenal. I believe that there is still a lot of work for the Israeli Air Force ahead of us.
Lebanon Operations
Late this evening, Tuesday, there was an unusual report coming out of the northern coastal city of Nahariya as residents were reporting suspicious parachutes in the area. The IDF troops are investigating. Nothing to report as of yet.
The big news of the day was that IDF fighter jets struck the Dehiyeh neighborhood of Beirut for the fifth time since the start of Hezbollah’s attacks on October 8. This time they managed to kill the Hezbollah top commander of their rocket and missile divisions, Ibrahim Qubaisi, along with two of his aides. This was later confirmed by Hezbollah. You can see a video of the strike and read more here.
IDF Spokesperson, Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, issued a statement today regarding the strike in Beirut saying:
At least two other commanders were eliminated along with Hezbollah's missile head Kaibisi. In recent days he was responsible for the shooting at Haifa - including this morning's shooting. Today, about 300 rockets were fired towards the Israeli rear, injuring 6 civilians and soldiers - most of them lightly injured. Hezbollah wanted to shoot more today. We are disrupting and thwarting his plan. I will not detail the data on Hezbollah's shooting reduction - in order not to provide the enemy with a clear picture. We still have a way to go. It should be remembered - Hezbollah still has other capabilities of different kinds, our role is to handle each of them, but first and foremost those whose risk to the Israeli rear is greater.
The IDF continues to ratchet up the jet aircraft missions over southern and eastern Lebanon. Last night was a busy night with many arms storage and launching facilities destroyed by IDF missile fire. Here you can see some videos of the missions. You will note that in most of them there are many secondary explosions proving that arms were stored in these facilities. Early this evening the IDF released to the press their assessment of the day’s operations. Just today the Israeli Air Force successfully destroyed 400 medium range rocket launchers, 70 arms depots and 80 drones/cruise missiles. Altogether the dispatched 250 fighter jets hit 1,500 Hezbollah targets. Then after that briefing, the IAF launched more fighter jet missions in the early evening, striking rocket launching positions in the Hezbollah controlled area of the Beqaa Valley.
According to reports in Saudi Arabia’s media outlet, Al Arabiya, in yesterday’s strikes into Lebanon by the IDF 4 Shiite clerics that double as Hezbollah commanders were killed, sheikhs Abdul Minam Mahna, Amin Saad, Muhammad Salah and Ali Abu Raya. One of them was apparently in Hezbollah’s Argentina service when a Jewish Community was bombed, killing more than 80 people in 1994. It is not clear if he had any direct connection or not.
Late last night a missile fired by an IDF drone successfully assassinated a Hamas field commander operating in Southern Lebanon, Mahmoud al Nader.
Syria/Iran/Jordan/Egypt/Iraq/Turkiye
There are reports that Hezbollah has appealed to Iran for assistance during the current IDF operations hitting them so hard. They are looking for Iran to launch another round of missile and drone attacks on Israel. But, so far Iran has refused. As they say in the Middle East, “Iran will fight to the last Arab”. To fully understand that statement you need to appreciate that the Iranians (Persians) are not Arab. They are a totally different race, speak a totally different language with a completely different culture.
Syrian officials say that they activated their air defense systems as some country launched an air strike on its port city of Tartus. My guess is that we will hear more tomorrow about this.
IDF/Government
Today MK Gaid Eisenkot, former IDF Chief of Staff and co-leader of the National Unity Party with Benny Gantz, conducted a podcast interview in Hebrew. In the interview he stated that current Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi should resign. In his words, “he is one of the three individuals who shoulder the main responsibility for our greatest disaster and must resign”. I find this hypocritical. When Eisenkot was Chief of Staff his Defense Minister was Avigdor Lieberman, back in 2016-2018. Lieberman issued an internal 10 page report describing how Hamas could launch an attack, just like the one on October 7 and that the IDF needed to plan a set of missions to start taking out the tunnels. Eisenkot pushed back and refused to act on the plan or provide a reasonable alternative. Hypocrite!!
At the end of the daily IDF assessment with the leaders of the IDF, IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi said that Hezbollah will not be granted a moment of rest. Military operations will continue to escalate until they announce their intent to move north of the Litani River. He said:
Hezbollah must not be given a break. [We must] keep working with all our might. We will accelerate the offensive operations today and bolster all the arrays. The situation requires continued intensive action on all fronts.
Yaakov Amidror, the former Israeli National Security Adviser, said during an interview on one of the Israeli TV stations today that Israel must fundamentally change the situation regarding Hezbollah and that might require a full all out war. He said:
Israel has to reach a situation where Hezbollah is not near the border and cannot even think about the possibility of doing its own version of October 7. It could be that we will have to go into southern Lebanon with ground forces, to ensure that south Lebanon has no Hezbollah infrastructure, no Hezbollah fighters. UN Resolution 1701, which ended the 2006 war didn’t hold for even three minutes. We can’t rely on anybody else to do the work. UNIFIL [the UN peacekeeping force] is a bad joke
In fact, those Radwan commanders killed last week when Aqil was killed in the Beirut neighborhood of Dehiyeh were planning such an operation. The original plan was for Hamas and Hezbollah to launch October 7 like operations at the same time. But Sinwar got an itchy trigger finger and launched prematurely.
Defense Minister Gallant traded messages with UN Secretary General Guterres. Gallant posted:
The UN is neither acknowledging their actions, nor fulfilling its fundamental obligation – preventing Hezbollah attacks and demanding the implementation of resolution 1701. Mr. Secretary General @antonioguterres, the nightmare you speak of, is in fact reality. The reality is that Hezbollah has taken Lebanon hostage, and the UN is neither acknowledging their actions, nor fulfilling its fundamental obligation – preventing Hezbollah attacks and…
You can read Gallant’s post here.
Guterres said in his opening remarks before the parade of International Leaders speak their turn at the UN General Assembly. He said, as part of his opening remarks:
…Meanwhile, Gaza is a non-stop nightmare that threatens to take the entire region with it. Look no further than Lebanon. We should all be alarmed by the escalation. Lebanon is at the brink. The people of Lebanon – the people of Israel – and the people of the world -- cannot afford Lebanon to become another Gaza. Let’s be clear. Nothing can justify the abhorrent acts of terror committed by Hamas on October 7th, or the taking of hostages – both of which I have repeatedly condemned. And nothing can justify the collective punishment of the Palestinian people. The speed and scale of the killing and destruction in Gaza are unlike anything in my years as Secretary-General
You can read his entire speech here.
Aid
COGAT reports that 155 trucks entered Gaza yesterday with aid, depositing their loads at the staging areas in Gaza. About 155 truck loads worth of goods were picked up for distribution, BUT by private NGO aid organizations. 95% of the aid sitting and waiting for distribution is the responsibility of UN organizations who are not doing their job.
Hostages/Ceasefire
Families of hostages critical of the daily, often violent, protests in Tel Aviv and elsewhere are starting to gather their voices and are being heard more. In this article the author describes how some families are viewing the protests as helping Hamas take more belligerent positions. It is worth the read.
Politics/Protests
With all this serious military activity, hundreds of rockets and real people being killed in Lebanon, we have are “esteemed” Justice Minister Yariv Levin, responsible for launching the ill conceived Judicial Reforms in 2023, playing games with our Supreme Court Justices. As I mentioned in my post from 3 days ago, he is nearly a year delinquent in convening the Judicial Committee for the purpose of selecting a replacement President of the Supreme Court. Unlike in the USA our judges MUST retire at the retirement age. He is delaying this because he wants to force down the throat of the country his rotten legislation that is intended to make the government in power to be the sole arbiter in deciding appointments on the court. This is in total violation of the separation of powers in any normal Democratic Republic such as ours. So in what he thought was a clever way of stalling he decided that all 11 members of the court had to be considered as possible candidates. By making so many candidates in the queue this “clever idiot” thought that it would force the whole process to be postponed. So all but 2 of the justices responded by removing themselves from candidacy in the process. I swear, you couldn’t make this stuff up. So now this “clever” minister of justice insists that they can’t do that and he rejects their requests. All he is trying to do is bypass the traditional process of electing the most senior justice of the court to be President. But he thinks that the justice in line is too “left wing” and prefers to bypass the process to push through a more “right wing” justice. Soon he and this government will be gone and the nightmare this idiot created will be just that… a nightmare. In the meantime we have a real war to fight.
International
Today US Vice President Kamala Harris met with UAE President Mohammed bin Zayed. According to their staff they discussed the war in Gaza and efforts to secure a ceasefire and hostage deal. They also discussed the war between Israel and Hezbollah, saying that all parties should work to deescalate and reach a diplomatic solution. Well, there is a diplomatic solution that was passed by the UN back in 2006 - Security Council Resolution 1701. Why not just demand that Hezbollah adhere to it??
The USA which has been sending its emissary Amos Hochstein on many trips to Israel and Lebanon for the past year claiming a diplomatic solution was at hand, announced that it has concrete ideas on how to ease the crisis in Lebanon. Israel’s representative at the UN, Danny Danon, replied that Israel is open to any new creative ideas and will listen. But the government’s position is that the operation in the north will not stop until it is safe for Israeli residents in our northern communities to return to their homes. And that means that Hezbollah must move ALL its forces north of the Litani River in compliance with UN Security Council Resolution 1701.
France has also requested an emergency UN Security Council meeting to discuss Lebanon. Nothing like having an ally that couldn’t care less as Hezbollah launched thousands of missiles into Israel over the course of the year. But once Israel takes them on, it is time to issue condemnations and hold an emergency meeting. Hezbollah has been in violation of UN Security Council Resolution 1701 for 19 years. Neither France nor any other power could have cared less. We do actually have some allies in Europe. But certainly neither France nor Ireland qualify.
This is the time of year that heads of state take the opportunity to address the UN General Assembly to impart the brilliance of their intellect and words of wisdom. I will list of few here…
First let’s start with one of my favorite personalities, European Union High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell (I guess that they like long titles in Europe.). This guy has never made a statement regarding Israel that did not include the word “genocide”. Today he said this:
It is again in the Geneva Convention to make explosives at a distance without taking any consideration for the environment where these explosives are exploding – either in a queue in a commercial center, in a public square, on the street, in a hospital, wherever. These are targeted and at the same time random attacks. Targeted because of the purpose and random because of the consequences. I condemned it. I continue condemning it.
I used to think I had a pretty good command of the English language. But I cannot make any sense of this statement, can you??
Then another one of my favorite characters spoke, President for Life of Turkiye Recep Tayyip Erdogan spoke in front of the UN General Assembly. He had these kind words to say:
Just as Hitler was stopped by an alliance of humanity seventy years ago, Netanyahu and his murder network must be stopped by an alliance of humanity. Those who are supposedly working for a ceasefire from this stage continue to send arms and ammunition to Israel so it can continue its massacres. What more are you waiting for to stop the massacre network that endangers also the lives of its own citizens along with the Palestinian people and drags the entire region into war for the sake of its political prospects?
Next among these distinguished and elegant speakers was the King of the Peacock Throne of Jordan, Abdullah. He had these nice things to say:
The attacks of October 7 on Israeli civilians last year were condemned by countries all over the world, including Jordan, but the unprecedented scale of terror unleashed on Gaza since that day is beyond any justification. The Israeli government’s assault has resulted in one of the fastest death rates in recent conflicts, one of the fastest rates of starvation caused by war, the largest cohort of child amputees and unprecedented levels of destruction. This Israeli government has killed more children, more journalists, more aid workers and more medical personnel than any other war in recent memory.
He neglected to say that on October 8 members of his phony parliament, as well as many residents in Amman, were busy celebrating and handing out sweets to mark the slaughter of Israelis.
Next up to speak at the UN General Assembly was the Qatari Prime Minister, Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani. Now, you need to remember that Qatar is an impartial mediator in the negotiations with Hamas, all the while they provide refuge to their leaders in 5 start hotels. Keep that in mind as you read this what he said at the UN:
This war is a crime of genocide by means of the most sophisticated weapons against people besieged in a detention camp where there is no escape from the barrage of aerial bombing. We oppose violence and the targeting of innocent civilians by any party, but after a year of this war… it is no longer tenable to talk about Israel’s right to defend itself in this context without being complicit in justifying the crime. Palestinians are an indigenous people on their own land… who are subjected to a settler colonial occupation, [which] has taken the form of an apartheid system in the 21st century
President Biden also spoke earlier today. He was probably the only voice of sanity at the UN today. Here are some of his thoughtful messages:
The world must not flinch from the horrors of October 7. Any country would have the right, the responsibility to ensure that such an attack could never happen again. Thousands of armed Hamas terrorists invaded a sovereign state, slaughtering and massacring more than 1,200 people, including 46 Americans, in their homes and at a music festival. Despicable acts of sexual violence. Two hundred and fifty innocents taken hostage. I’ve met with the families of those hostages. I’ve grieved with them. They’re going through hell.
Innocent civilians in Gaza are also going through hell. Thousands and thousands of civilians, including aid workers — too many families displaced, crowding in tents, facing a dire humanitarian situation. They didn’t ask for this war that Hamas started.
I put forward with Qatar and Egypt a ceasefire and hostage deal. It’s been endorsed by the UN Security Council. Now is the time for the parties to finalize its terms, bring the hostages home, secure security for Israel and a Gaza free of Hamas’s grip, ease the suffering in Gaza and end this war
We will miss you, President Biden!!!
And In Your Copious Spare Time…
Seth Franzman, a sailing friend and a military correspondent with vast experience in the Middle East, filed this report for The Jerusalem Post summarizing the Hezbollah threat. I recommend you read it.
Some of you might find this article on female sniper units in the IDF an interesting read. For some time I knew that women were often responsible for training new snipers in the IDF. But I was unaware how much influence and action they are seeing in this war.
I found this article describing the state of Lebanese hospitals and their healthcare system revealing. It was written by the Arab correspondent for The Times of Israel and somehow he was able to conduct interviews with several prominent Lebanese. What he heard, and wrote, tells us a lot about the state of what is going on there.
And if you wonder why/how Israel is able to gather so much information about what is happening in Syria, in order to aid its missions there, take a look at this article. In it many Syrian victims of Hezbollah and the Syrian Government describe horrific atrocities perpetrated on them during the Civil War. They want to see Hezbollah hurt bad.
And finally, if you remain confused about the difference between a Fahdi-1, drone or anti-tank missile and what to understand more about the arms being used by Hezbollah you can read this for a reference.