Israeli President Isaac Herzog threatened further military action against Hezbollah a day after Israel launched airstrikes in Lebanon, killing more than 550 people in the country’s deadliest day in nearly two decades.
It marked a dramatic escalation of hostilities between Israel and Iran-backed Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, after nearly 12 months of attacks since the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza, fueling fears of an all-out regional war.
Thousands of Lebanese in the south of the country fled their homes amid the bombardment, with many receiving automated text messages and phone calls telling them to evacuate. The Israeli government issued a warning to people in areas of Lebanon targeted by Hezbollah.
Asked whether Israel would launch a full-scale ground operation in Lebanon, Herzog insisted that his country did not want war.
“Israel is not interested, does not want this war, and is not interested in going to war with Lebanon,” Herzog told CNBC’s Dan Murphy on Tuesday.
“But Israel has been attacked since October 8 from Lebanon without borders. And if you look at the current situation, Hezbollah has launched missiles and rockets all over the northern region of Israel. So we will do everything to bring our citizens back home. and make peace in our cities.
“We have shown our capabilities, and we have more on the way, if we continue,” added Herzog.
Hezbollah has continued to fire rockets into northern Israel since the attack, most of which have landed in open areas or been intercepted by air defenses. On Saturday, the group launched a salvo of more than 100 missiles into northern Israel, killing at least five people, Israeli authorities said.
Hezbollah said the attack was in response to a fence attack and detonation of a device last week that killed 38 people, including several children, and injured more than 3,000. It said the attack was carried out by Israel, which has yet to comment.
Lebanon’s Health Ministry said Monday’s Israeli attack killed at least 558 people, including 50 children, and injured more than 1,800.
Smoke rises from the site of an Israeli airstrike in Marjayoun, near the Lebanon-Israel border, on September 23, 2024.
Rabih Daher Afp | Getty Images
Monday’s death toll was not only the deadliest day of fighting between Israel and Hezbollah since the 34-day war in 2006; it also extends from the Port of Beirut 2020 explosion that killed nearly 200 people and destroyed several neighborhoods of the capital.
Opening the 79th session of the United Nations General Assembly in New York on Tuesday, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned member states of the risk of Lebanon “becoming another Gaza.”
“Gaza is a nonstop nightmare that threatens to take the whole region with it. Look no further than Lebanon,” said Guterres, adding that all countries should be “feared by the escalation” between Israel and Hezbollah.
On Monday, President Joe Biden said the US was trying to calm the situation, while the Pentagon said it was “Israel’s right to defend itself” and announced that additional US troops were being sent to the Middle East. The US has around 40,000 troops in the region.
Tens of thousands of people on both sides of the Israel-Lebanon border have had to leave their homes as a result of cross-border fires in the month following the October 7 attack on Israel by Hamas. Israeli leaders have vowed that residents of northern Israel who have been evacuated will be able to return to their homes.
Vehicles wait in traffic in the town of Damour, south of the capital Beirut on September 24, 2024, as people flee southern Lebanon.
Ibrahim Amro Afp | Getty Images
“First and foremost, we have to remove the threat from the northern border of Israel, and that’s what we’re trying to do,” Herzog said.
Some lawmakers in Israel’s government, which is the most right-wing in the country’s history, have called for southern Lebanon to be reoccupied. Israel occupied southern Lebanon between 1985 and 2000 – a period of bloody sectarian war – following a series of attacks into Israeli territory by Lebanon-based Palestinian militants.
Asked if reoccupying southern Lebanon was part of Israel’s ultimate goal, Herzog replied, “No, it’s not.”
“The position of the Israeli government is clear, and I repeat, we have no territorial expectations or ambitions in Lebanon or anywhere else,” the president said.
“We also have no territorial ambitions in Gaza, but we have an inherent right, which is given to any nation in the world to live in peace and quiet, not to be attacked every day by missiles and rockets and terror.”
Israel launched its invasion of Gaza after an October 7 attack by Hamas militants that killed around 1,200 people in Israel and took another 253 hostages, 116 of whom have since been released. Since then, Israeli attacks on the blockaded enclave have killed more than 41,000 people in Gaza, according to Palestinian health authorities.
