IDF has carried out more than 1,100 airstrikes on southern Lebanon since ground war began
Israel has carried out more than 1,100 airstrikes on southern Lebanon since its ground war began earlier this month, its military announced on Wednesday. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said in a statement it had attacked “munitions warehouses, launchers, tunnel shafts and observation and sniping positions” in the airstrikes.
IDF aircraft and ground forces are working closely together to multiply force and help “neutralize threats,” it continued.
IDF will continue war against Hezbollah with no room for "respite or recovery"
Israel will continue to “strike Hezbollah with intensity, without allowing them any respite or recovery,” according to the head of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF).
Herzi Halevi said Wednesday that Hezbollah had been weakened and was “making efforts to conceal the significant damage” it had suffered.
“They are experiencing command and control difficulties, leading to confusion at the decision-making level and challenges in their operational capabilities,” Halevi said.
Also speaking on Wednesday, Israel’s Minister of Defense Yoav Gallant said the recent Iranian attacks on Israel had been “aggressive” but ultimately “failed” since no military assets were damaged.
On the prospect of Israeli retaliation, Gallant said: “Our strike will be powerful, precise, and above all – surprising. They will not understand what happened and how it happened.”
Smoke billows from the site of an Israeli airstrike that targeted a neighbourhood in the southern suburbs of Beirut on Wednesday
US says Israel must avoid Gaza-like military action in Lebanon
Israel must avoid conducting military operations in Lebanon like it has in Gaza, the US State Department has said.
“I’m making very clear that there should be no kind of military action in Lebanon that looks anything like Gaza and leaves a result anything like Gaza,” State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller told journalists.
A week ago, however, Miller said the US supports Israel’s military action in Lebanon. “We do ultimately want to see a ceasefire and diplomatic resolution, but we do think it’s appropriate that Israel, at this point, is bringing terrorists to justice,” he said.
Biden expresses support for Israel in call marking the Jewish High Holidays
US President Joe Biden joined a call marking the Jewish High Holidays Wednesday, in which he expressed his support for Israel, touting “unprecedented action … to successfully assist in the successful defense of Israel,” following attacks by Iran and its proxies, while nodding to the at-times tense relationship between Israel’s leadership and the US.
“You’ve heard me say before that I got very badly criticized as a young senator, saying, ‘I’m a Zionist.’ You don’t have to be a Jew to be a Zionist, that’s not necessary, and the idea, I firmly believe, without an Israel, every Jew in the world’s security is less stable – I mean that,” Biden said.
“It doesn’t mean that Jewish leadership doesn’t have to be more progressive than it is, but it does mean it has to exist, and that’s what worries me most about what’s going on now.”
Earlier Wednesday, the White House said Biden held a “direct” 30-minute call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, with the two leaders discussing “a range of issues,” including Israel’s response to Iran’s ballistic missile attack.
“I just spoke to Prime Minister Netanyahu for about an hour this morning, and offered my condolences on this somber one-year anniversary,” Biden said on Wednesday’s call.
