Lebanese see US potentially as being a party to this war

There is deep scepticism here in Lebanon about any US administration because so many people see the US as being a party to this war, and they say the US should not be either a negotiator or in any way really involved in talks to try to forge a ceasefire.

Trump has described himself as a man who wants to end wars, but he’s widely known as being closer to Netanyahu than Biden was. So there is this concern that we could well see an escalation between now and January 20 when Trump officially takes office.

Interestingly enough, there have been at least three strikes this afternoon on the southern suburbs of Beirut. And in the last half an hour, authorities in Baalbek said there were 20 air strikes today, where at least 30 people were killed and 35 wounded.

In terms of official reaction to the US election results, we had a statement from the Hezbollah’s new chief, Naim Qassem.

He said that “there is one thing that will end this war, and that is the battlefield. This war is not winnable for the Israelis.” He said, “There is no place in Israel that is off-limits to our planes and our missiles.”

 
Lebanon’s PM: Israel obstructing all efforts to curb its aggression

Lebanon’s caretaker prime minister said that Israel’s assault on his country has morphed into crimes against humanity and a breach of all international charters and norms.

In remarks he gave to Lebanon’s cabinet, Najib Mikati added that Israel is obstructing all international efforts to curb its aggression against his country.

Mikati said he holds the international community responsible for Israel’s relentless genocidal war against his people, destruction of towns and villages, targeting of military service members, medical and civil defence personnel and relief workers, as well as UNIFIL peacekeepers.

In Lebanon, the feeling is there won’t be change until Trump takes office

Lebanon’s government is renewing its call for a ceasefire and the implementation of United Nations Resolution 1701 to bring an end to Israel’s war.

That would involve a Hezbollah pullback from the southern border areas and the deployment of the Lebanese army. But it is again accusing the Israeli government of rejecting all diplomatic initiatives.

And the feeling in Lebanon is there won’t be any new initiative, at least not until Trump takes office in late January.

During his campaign, Trump promised to end the conflict in the Middle East. But he didn’t say how. There’s concern there that the coming weeks will witness an escalation.

UN members must defend agency against Israel ban: UNRWA chief

The UN’s aid agency for Palestinian refugees is facing its “darkest hour”, its chief says as he implores member states to defend it against an Israeli ban. “Without intervention by member states, UNRWA will collapse, plunging millions of Palestinians into chaos,” Philippe Lazzarini told the UN General Assembly.

Lazzarini called for the UN – which created UNRWA in 1949 – to prevent implementation of the Israeli ban.

Not looking good for UNWRA with Trump in power. The US halted funding until 2025, Trump will make it indefinite.


UNGA president says Israel’s UNRWA ban ‘intolerable affront’

Philemon Yang, the president of the UN General Assembly, has expressed “deep alarm” at two Israeli laws which “if implemented, would prevent UNRWA from undertaking its essential work”.

“This decision constitutes an intolerable affront to the authority of the General Assembly, to international law and, most importantly, to the human dignity of innocent Palestinian civilians,” said Yang, who is also the former prime minister of Cameroon, at a meeting he called after Israel’s parliament passed two bills banning UNRWA last week.

UNRWA was created by the UN General Assembly on December 8, 1949, to provide basic support including food, healthcare and education to tens of thousands of Palestinian refugees.

Attacks on UNWRA ‘more proof of Israel’s genocide in Gaza’

Palestine’s envoy to the UN, Riyad Mansour, has addressed a meeting of the UN General Assembly over Israel’s plan to ban the UN’s aid agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA.

Here are the major talking points from his speech:

Palestinians ‘starving while the world watches’

UN humanitarian chief Joyce Msuya has warned that Palestinian civilians in Gaza are “starving while the world watches on”. “For the past month, North Gaza has been under a near-total brutal siege,” Msuya said in a social media post.

“Israeli military operations have left Palestinians without the essentials to survive,” she said, adding “these atrocities must stop.”

That's 2 weeks old, no improvement since

Israel withdrawing reserve division from Gaza

The Israeli army says in a post on X that the 252nd Reserve Division will leave the central Gaza Strip “after several months of fighting in the area”.

According to The Times of Israel, the division operated in the Netzarim Corridor area, a 6.5km (4-mile) wide strip of land occupied by Israeli forces that cuts the Gaza Strip in two.

Israel’s prolonged assaults on Gaza, the occupied West Bank and now Lebanon have seen the Israeli army searching for more conscripts, including ultra-Orthodox Jewish men and, according to some reports, African migrants.

Israel’s assault on Gaza has not slowed down

As the world’s attention was fixed on the US elections, Israel’s assault on Gaza did not slow down.

Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud reports from Deir el-Balah in central Gaza:

WHO chief says up to 10,000 children could not be reached for polio vaccination

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said polio vaccination concluded in the north of Gaza where vaccination rates were slightly lower at around 88 percent coverage because up to 10,000 children could not be reached to receive a second dose.

Those children are still “vulnerable to polio”, the WHO chief said, adding that “efforts will continue to reach more children through regular health services”.

‘Israel will keep invading – with more ease’: Gaza dreads Trump presidency

For the past 13 months, Ahmed Jarad has been living with the dim hope that he might one day return to his home in Beit Lahiya, a village in the north of the Gaza Strip.

But on Wednesday, as Trump declared his triumphant return to the White House, Jarad said his dream of returning to his hometown, currently being pounded by Israel and its stranded population sealed off from the south, has been crushed.

Jarad said he is certain that Israel’s brutality will only worsen once Trump, who enjoyed a close relationship with Netanyahu during his first presidency, is once again sworn in as leader of the world’s strongest superpower.

Trump helped Netanyahu back in power, Netanyahu returned the favor.

Israeli forces kill Palestinian man in Jenin

A Palestinian man has been shot and killed by Israeli forces in Jenin, in the occupied West Bank, the Palestinian Ministry of Health said.

His death brings the number of Palestinians killed in Jenin in the past 48 hours to seven, and 10 across the occupied West Bank, Wafa news agency said.

Main points on November 6th

• At least 40 people killed in Israeli strikes around Baalbek in eastern Lebanon.
• At least 15 Palestinians were killed in an Israeli attack on a house in Gaza’s Beit Lahiya as footage verified by Al Jazeera shows a new wave of displacement of families from parts of the city in the north of the Gaza Strip.
• Lebanon’s civil defence crew has pulled 30 bodies from the rubble of an apartment building in Barja, after it was destroyed in an Israeli strike yesterday.
• Netanyahu has spoken with Trump about “the Iranian threat” after praising his “huge victory” in the elections.
• Egypt has joined a call led by Turkey and backed by dozens of countries, urging the UN to halt arms deliveries to Israel.
  
  

Really does feel like, (not that America wasn't already supporting a genocide in Palestine), that they are now about to let a genocide happen in Ukraine as well. What a country...It's a real mystery why so much of the world mocks and hates America. If Harris won I would have immediately started blasting her to stop Israel and hope that she could be budged on the issue but with Trump...Yeah...

Netanyahu is 75 at least...Yet another fascist asshole close to death by old age is the only comfort I can take.

Israeli military launches attacks on southern Beirut

Israeli fighter jets are carrying out a “very heavy bombardment” in an area near Beirut International Airport, with four consecutive strikes reported, Lebanon’s Al Araby Al Jadeed news outlet reports.

The airport “sustained minor damage” as a result of the attacks, according to the report. No casualties or injuries have been reported so far. Footage published by the Palestinian Information Center reportedly shows a large explosion near the runway.

‘Huge fireball’ seen in Beirut, as fires break out following Israeli strikes

A “huge fireball” has been seen in Beirut following Israeli attacks on the Lebanese capital’s southern suburbs over the past hour, the Reuters news agency reports. Footage published by the Quds News Network also shows a fire reportedly raging in a building in the Tahwitat al-Ghadir area adjacent to Beirut’s international airport.

Earlier, we reported that Israeli fighter jets had carried out at least four large strikes on southern Beirut. The target of the strikes is not yet clear, and no casualties or injuries have been reported so far.

Aftermath of Israeli strikes on Beirut’s southern suburbs

Israel’s war on Lebanon has ‘reached a critical point’, UN warns

Almost 873,000 people have been displaced within Lebanon by Israel’s attacks on the country, and the majority of those are women, the United Nations reports in its latest flash update on the humanitarian crisis.

To date, 78 attacks on healthcare facilities across Lebanon have been reported and 130 health workers have been killed in Israeli attacks, with a further 111 injured, the UN said.

“The ongoing conflict in Lebanon has reached a critical point, with over 3,000 deaths recorded since 8 October 2023 – 58 percent more than the 1,900 fatalities during the 2006 conflict,” the UN added.

“Additionally, an estimated 1.3 million people have been displaced, both within Lebanon and into neighbouring countries, 33 percent more than the number of people displaced in 2006.”

Injured residents return to homes devastated by Israeli air attack in Lebanon’s Barja

Lebanese rescue workers continued to dig through the rubble of a destroyed apartment building in the town of Barja, south of Beirut, on Wednesday after the Lebanese Health Ministry said 20 people were killed in an Israeli air strike the previous night.

A resident of the destroyed building, Moussa Zahran – who lived on one of the upper floors of the block – returned to sift through the ruins of his home with his burned feet wrapped in gauze and his son and wife still recovering in hospital from their wounds.

“These rocks that you see here weigh 100 kilos; they fell on a 13-kilo kid,” Zahran told the Reuters news agency, referring to the weight of his young son and the apartment wall that collapsed on him during the Israeli attack.

Israel gave no warning before the strike.

_{Moussa Zahran sits inside his house, which was destroyed in an Israeli strike, in Barja, Lebanon, on Wednesday}

Uncle of Hezbollah’s late leader Nasrallah reported killed

Hezbollah has reported that an uncle of the movement’s late leader, Hassan Nasrallah, has been killed in an Israeli attack.

In a post on social media, the movement said that sources had announced the death of Nasrallah’s uncle – identified as Abu Haider Nasrallah – in an attack in southern Lebanon’s Bazouriyeh area, in Tyre district.

He was killed alongside his family, Hezbollah said in a short post.

Hassan Nasrallah, 64, was killed in an Israeli strike in September after leading the armed group for 32 years. Nasrallah was replaced as Hezbollah’s secretary-general by Naim Qassem, the longtime number two to the late leader.

Israeli military announces death of soldier in Hezbollah attack

The Israeli military has said a 20-year-old soldier with the 605th Engineering Battalion was killed on Wednesday in a Hezbollah rocket attack in the Avivim area of ​​the upper Galilee in northern Israel.

Israeli authorities say at least 70 people have been killed by Hezbollah attacks in Israel and the occupied Golan Heights since the outbreak of intense clashes in October 2023.