News Digest — 8/2/24
Netanyahu Says Israel On High Alert
Israel is in a state of “high readiness” against any scenario, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday (1st) as the United States intensified efforts to prevent an all-out war amid threats of a direct attack against the Jewish state by Iran and Hezbollah.
“Israel is in a state of very high readiness for any scenario – on both defense and offense – we will exact a very high price for any act of aggression against us from any quarter whatsoever,” Netanyahu said.
He spoke in the aftermath of the Israeli assassination of Hezbollah commander Fuad Shukri, who was responsible for the Golan Heights rocket strike that killed 12 children. Israel has taken responsibility for Shukri’s elimination.
Netanyahu also announced on Thursday (1st) that there was final confirmation that the IDF had successfully assassinated the head of Hamas’ Izzadin al-Qassam Brigades, Mohammed Deif, last month.
Israel has not taken responsibility for Wednesday’s (7/31) killing of Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran. However, it is widely believed that the Jewish state was behind the hit.
Meanwhile, Hezbollah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah said on Thursday (1st) that “the resistance cannot but respond. This is definite.” He spoke during a television address to mark the funeral of the slain commander Fuad Shukri, attended by mourners clad in black waving the group’s yellow and green flag.
“We are looking for a real response, not a performative one, and for real opportunities. A studied response,” Nasrallah stated.
Netanyahu, during a visit to the Home front Command on Thursday (1st) said, “Whoever harms us, we will harm them.”
The prime minister also held a meeting Thursday (2nd) on hostage talks with his Military Secretary Maj. -Gen Roman Gofman, his Chief of Staff, Tzachi Braverman, and the coordinator for the Hostages and the Missing, Brig.-Gen. (res.) Gal Hirsch.
Israel and US officials have said that the talks are ongoing.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken told reporters in Mongolia that it was critical for both Hamas and Israel to finalize the three phase hostage deal that Biden had unveiled on May 31st, which would pause the war. The US believes that this agreement would lead to a permanent ceasefire in the Gaza War that began on Oct.7 with Hamas’ invasion of southern Israel.
On the issue of a wider regional war, US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan told reporters in Washington that, “We have been laser focused on trying to prevent a wider war since October both in the Gaza Strip and on Israel’s northern border.
“We believe we do have to be engaging in intensive efforts now, through deterrence, through deescalation, through diplomacy, to prevent a wider war and we will continue to do that,” Sullivan stressed.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov held a phone call with Iran’s acting Foreign Minister, Ali Bagheri Kani, on Thursday (1st), the Russian Foreign Ministry said.
According to the ministry’s statement, both sides expressed their condemnation of the killing of Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran and pointed out “the extremely dangerous consequences of such actions.”
Separately, China hopes Palestinian factions can create an independent state as soon as possible, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson said on Thursday (1st) while addressing a query on the killing of the Hamas chief in Iran.
“China earnestly looks forward to all Palestinian factions “internally reconciling,” and creating a Palestinian state as soon as possible, FM spokesperson Lin Jian said, during a regular press briefing.
More Airlines Ground Israel Flights As Regional Conflict Heats Up
A wave of flight cancellations to Israel continued Thursday (1st) as regional tensions escalated following the assassination of senior Hezbollah and Hamas officials in Beirut and Tehran.
Several airlines, including United Airlines and Delta Air Lines, had already temporarily suspended their flights to the country on Wednesday (7/31). They have now been joined by Lufthansa, Fly Dubai, and Brussels Airline, further affecting air travel to the region.
United Airlines, which operates 14 weekly flights from New York and Newark, notified its customers that upcoming flights to Israel are canceled.
Delta Airlines, which only resumed flights to Israel last month and operates a daily service from New York to Tel Aviv, canceled its flights scheduled for up through Friday (2nd) from JFK.
Earlier in the week, Lufthansa implemented a new procedure for flights to Israel with layovers at Larnaca Airport in Cyprus to change aircrews. However, two flights scheduled to continue from Cyprus to Tel Aviv were canceled. Passengers reported receiving no prior notification and expressed surprise at the capital’s announcement.
An Austrian Airlines flight from Vienna to Tel Aviv turned back mid-air, landing in Sofia before returning to Vienna. A passenger relayed that the captain cited security concerns as a reason for the diversion.
Despite the disruptions, Israeli airlines continue as scheduled. El Al’s website noted that flights are proceeding as planned, with ongoing coordination with security authorities. Israir reiterated its commitment to the planned schedule, operating under security authority guidance. Arkia announced preparations for increased flights to Athens, anticipating foreign cancellations.
The Airports Authority reported that approximately 70,000 passengers would pass through Ben Gurion airport on Thursday (1st) where 413 international flights were scheduled. The majority of passengers were departing on international flights, while 32,000 were entering Israel.
In April, Israel closed its airspace for seven hours following an extensive Iranian drone and missile attack.
Col. Richard Kemp: ‘Hamas Is On Its Knees’
Colonel Richard Kemp, the former commander of the British military forces in Afghanistan, Spoke to Israel National News on Thursday (1st) about the assassinations of Hezbollah leader Fuad Shukri in a Beirut suburb and Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran this week.
Col. Kemp called the assassinations “very significant, because they show Iran, Hezbollah and the other terrorists ranged against Israel that Israel can strike them whenever and wherever it chooses. This is particularly significant in Tehran which is heavily protected with advanced Russian air defense systems”
He explained why, in his opinion, Israel claimed responsibility for the assassination for Shukri but not for the assassination of Haniyeh. “Israel had to declare responsibility for Shukri to prove its readiness to retaliate against those directly responsible for murdering Israelis. That is why Israel took responsibility for the attack on Hudaydah port in Yemen after the Houthi drone strike on Tel Aviv. But generally Israeli policy is not to comment on international operations. This can add to the confusion among Israel’s enemies and sometimes allow them to save face by not retaliating. In this case, the timing and circumstances of the killing of Haniyeh does not allow that and Iran is likely to feel obliged to retaliate in some way.”
Col. Kemp dismissed claims that Israel is causing an unnecessary escalation of the conflict with these assassinations. “It is not Israel that is escalating. Iran and its proxies started this war and the most recent major escalation came from Hezbollah in its murder of 12 Druze children. In this region, restraint is provocation and encourages greater violence. The Israeli leadership understands the dynamics even though most Western leaders do not. They know that Israel’s survival has always depended on hard military power and the courage to use it when needed.
“The killing of Haniyeh may damage the hostage negotiations, but where were they going anyway with Hamas’ intransigence and unacceptable demands?” he said. “On the other hand, military presence has in the past succeeded in getting hostages released. Hamas is on its knees now and it may be that the elimination of their top negotiator will force his replacement to be more reasonable.”
When asked about the lack of response from the US to the assassination of Shukri, who was responsible for the murder of 241 American servicemen in a terrorist bombing in Beirut in 1983, Kemp stated that “the White House is acting as though it’s walking on nettles, afraid to exert itself even in this dangerous situation. Timorous US policies still prioritizing appeasement of Iran, have contributed to the instability we see in the Middle East today. However, at least they are sending more warships to the region to deter Iran and its proxies and hopefully will if necessary again join Israel’s defense as they did on April 14th.”
The Colonel stated that despite the losses Hamas has suffered in the last 10 months at war, the terrorist organization will quickly be able to replace Haniyeh and Mohammed Deif, the Commander of Hamas’ Military Wing who, the IDF confirmed on Thursday (1st) was eliminated in an airstrike in Khan Yunis on July 13th.
“But,” he said, “the killings will have done major damage to Hamas and Hezbollah, both of which have sustained severe loss to their leadership since the war began. Haniyeh and Shukri have both been involved in their respective terrorist groups for decades and their internal and international networks will not be easily replaced. The IRGC Quds Force has not yet recovered from the killing of their leader Qassem Soleimani four years ago.”
When asked what response Israel can expect from Iran and Hezbollah following these assassinations, he stated that “We will have to see how they respond. They might again launch attacks from Iran and Lebanon, and perhaps bring into play their proxies in Yemen, Syria, Iraq and the West Bank. Hamas in Gaza is so badly degraded, it’s unlikely to be able to make any serious contribution. Israel knew the risks of the various retaliatory options before they launched strikes on Tehran and Beirut and so are well prepared to defend the population and strike back even harder.”
The US government had a $5 million bounty on the head of Fuad Shukri for his role in the 1983 Beirut barracks bombing. Now that he has been killed, Col. Kemp said that this bounty “should be paid by the US to the families of Shukri’s victims in Majdal Shams.”
Israel’s War For Security – Bret Stephens
The war Israel is now waging against Hamas and its allies in Gaza and the West Bank, Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen, and Iran itself is about security. Israelis want to be able to live safely in their homes without fearing they could be rocketed, pillaged, killed or kidnapped with barely a moment’s warning.
The great threat of a major escalation on Israel’s northern border has turned entire cities into ghost towns and displaced more than 60,000 Israelis from their homes. That’s the proportional equivalent of two million Americans forced out of their homes. Those who condemn Israel now for its allegedly disproportionate response to the attacks by Hamas and Hezbollah would be more intellectually honest if they asked themselves what they would demand of their own governments if they were in the same situation.
Israel’s most strident critics insist that the current conflict is about Palestinian existence, but that’s a dishonest claim. Israel agreed to a Palestinian Authority in 1993, offered a Palestinian state in 2000 and vacated Gaza in 2005. When campus protesters at Princeton chanted, “We don’t want no two states, we want ‘48,” they weren’t asking for Israel to accept a Palestinian state. They were demanding Israel’s abolition. They were also adopting the views of Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran. (New York Times)
Iran’s Existential Threat To Israel – Rabbi Warren Goldstein
If Israel does not destroy Iran’s production of nuclear weapons, no one else will. In 1981, Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin faced a similar decision. Under Saddam Hussein, Iraq had begun pressing ahead with its nuclear program. Just like Iran, Saddam had issued genocidal threats against Israel. So Menachem Begin ordered a daring Israel Air Force operation on June 7, 1981.
Begin’s trusted adviser Yehuda Avner, in his book The Prime Ministers, describes how the Israeli pilots flew below Saudi, Jordanian and Iraqi radar to destroy the nuclear facility situated at Osirak in the heart of Baghdad and return home unscathed. As the jets returned to base safely, Begin said: “The atomic bombs which the reactor was capable of producing would have been of the Hiroshima size, thus a mortal danger to the people of Israel.”
“Let the world know that under no circumstances will Israel ever allow an enemy to develop weapons of mass destruction against our people. If ever such a threat reoccurs, we shall take whatever preemptive measures are necessary to defend the citizens of Israel with all the means at our disposal.”
Afterward, as expected, Begin faced a barrage of criticism. The Reagan administration suspended delivery of F-16 aircraft to Israel and voted in support of a UN Security Council resolution condemning Israel’s actions.
Begin responded: “What greater act of self-defense could there be than to destroy Saddam Hussein’s nuclear potential that was intended to bring Israel to its knees, slaughter our people, vaporize our infrastructure, destroy our nation, our country, our very existence?”
So we’ve been through all of this. We’ve seen it before. None of it is new. Today Israel faces the same situation with Iran. The prospect of mutually assured destruction, which deterred the Soviet regime during the Cold War, won’t deter Iran. As the late political analyst Charles Krauthammer observed, ‘mutually assured destruction for jihadists who glorify death and martyrdom is an incentive, not a deterrent.
The writer is chief rabbi of South Africa. (JNS)
(jns.org)
