As Israel Refuses to End Genocide in Gaza, Threat of War With Hezbollah Looms

Daniel Falcone, Truthout

July 2, 2024

For the past eight months, Hezbollah has attacked the northern portion of Israel in an attempt to pull the Israeli army out from Gaza, reports Al Jazeera. Fears of a wider war have prompted international calls to deescalate the situation at the border between Lebanon and Israel. During a recent meeting with Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told reporters that the U.S. is “urgently seeking a diplomatic agreement that restores lasting calm to Israel’s northern border and enables civilians to return safely to their homes on both sides of the Israel-Lebanon border.” The U.S. is also preparing to be ready to evacuate tens of thousands of Americans who live in Lebanon in the event of war.

 

In this interview, exclusive for Truthout, academics Lawrence Davidson and Stephen Zunes break down the rapidly developing situation in Lebanon. The scholars highlight U.S.-backed Israeli incursions that have incidentally resulted in a host of Security Council violations while commenting on the relationship between Hezbollah and Hamas and the 2006 war. Further, they touch on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s calculations and the prospects and politics of risking wider war.

Daniel Falcone: It’s being reported that nearly 100,000 Lebanese have been displaced since October by U.S.-backed Israeli attacks with the use of white phosphorus, which is banned by the international community. What are the Israel’s stated goals in Lebanon compared to what’s happening on the ground?

Lawrence Davidson: There has been a clearing of the population on both sides of the border since October 7. This is especially true on the Israeli side where most of the population has been forced to move south. It is less so on the Lebanese side, but that has been changing in the last month or so. I am not sure of the numbers, but the area of Lebanon near the border has been less populated for decades because of past Israeli incursions. The Israelis have been using phosphorus bombs for the last couple of years on the Palestinian population. They have now introduced this banned weapon into Lebanon. The Israeli goal is to create a buffer zone of about 10 kilometers of “no man’s land” on the Lebanese side of the border. If they can move Hezbollah back from the border far enough to put most of their northern towns out of artillery range, they can bring their population back to the north.

Stephen Zunes: Like every Israeli attack on Lebanon, Syria, Gaza or the West Bank, Israel justifies it in the name of self-defense, though few countries outside of the United States see it that way. Since October, Hezbollah has occasionally been lobbing shells and small rockets into northern Israel with little damage, holding back on their arsenal or larger Iranian-supplied missiles which could strike anywhere in Israel with devastating results. Meanwhile, Israel has been engaging in regular airstrikes on Lebanon, which would be receiving more international media attention were it not for the far greater carnage in Gaza. Current estimates as of mid-June are that 414 Lebanese have been killed, about one quarter of whom have been civilians.

My sense is that Netanyahu is hoping to provoke a major military response from Hezbollah which could possibly also include Iran. Most of the world opposes Israel’s war on the Palestinians but may see Israel in a more sympathetic light if faced with attacks by Iran and its proxies. A major war with Hezbollah and/or Iran would unite an increasingly divided Israeli public, would strengthen Netanyahu’s hand, and would distract global attention from ongoing atrocities in Gaza.

The New York Times has called the Hezbollah/Israeli war as “a careful dance.” They argue that all sides wish to inhibit the conditions that could set off a wider war. What’s the nature of this conflict?

Davidson: There have been two past wars on the Lebanese border and periods of occupation by Israel. These wars helped give rise to Hezbollah. Hezbollah is an ally of the Palestinian resistance movement now led by Hamas. It has aided then with some training and financial support. Hezbollah is also allied with Iran which has helped arm Hezbollah (but not Hamas). Hezbollah has always been tactically careful because of the amount of sheer destruction Israel can wreak on Lebanon. However, if they have developed an arsenal capable of defending against Israeli airstrikes, they might risk a wider war. It is that identification with the Palestinians as fellow Muslims who have been displaced by a non-Muslim colonial movement, backed by the West, that characterizes the conflict in the minds of Hezbollah members.

Zunes: Hezbollah, with the likely support of Iran, wants to demonstrate solidarity with the Palestinian struggle by sending an occasional rocket barrage into northern Israel, but they have little interest in provoking a wider conflict. A major war with vastly superior Israeli forces would be incredibly damaging with enormous military and civilian casualties. By keeping things at a low level, Hezbollah and Iran are reaping enormous political benefits throughout the Middle East as they see growing hatred of Israel for its atrocities, growing anger at the United States for supporting it, and growing disappointment at other Western nations and with Arab leaders for failing to stop it. Hezbollah’s standing in Lebanon and elsewhere was hurt greatly by its support for Assad during the Syrian civil war but is now growing again as a result of Israeli policies.

Mouin Rabbani, an excellent Middle East analyst, has indicated that U.S. and Israeli intelligence found no connections between Hamas and Iranian, Syrian or Yemeni proxies on October 7. If no one is working with Hamas, how has Israel justified the onslaught in Lebanon?

Davidson: The Gaza Palestinians have been largely isolated by the Israeli blockade. There are, of course, underground connections and communications between Hamas and the outside, including the Gulf Arab states (from whom they have gotten financial support). But they have received no material aid like weapons. The weapons they now use against Israel are of their own manufacture. The Israeli aim is to ethnically cleanse the Palestinians and so they feel that they need no further justification. Israelis frame their genocidal aims in terms of self-defense against Palestinian resistance.

Zunes: Hamas’s ties with Iran and its proxies have been greatly exaggerated. They were on opposite sides during the Syrian civil war. Iran has been closer with Hamas’s rival Islamic Jihad. Most of Hamas’s support has come from virulently anti-Iranian Arab Gulf states. And the amount of financial and military support Hamas has received from Iran has been quite small compared with the support Iran has provided Hezbollah and Iranian allies elsewhere. It appears that Israel’s attacks on Hezbollah and other Iranian-allied militia in Lebanon and Syria are based more on Israel’s long standing desire to cripple their capabilities overall and they are using the Gaza war as a cover.

In what ways do the current tensions mirror the July War of 2006? How have international priorities shifted since?

Davidson: I think there is some similarity with the 2006 conflict in terms of initial motivation. The 2006 war saw Hezbollah seeking to take hostages to force Israel into a prisoner exchange. The October 7 effort by the Palestinian resistance was at least partially the same. On October 7, the Palestinians had other goals as well: a) to halt the normalization process that was going on between Israel and Arab states, b) to refocus world attention back on the plight of the Palestinians. All these goals have, to date, been quite successful, but at a very high cost. The Gaza cities and towns now resemble Dresden after the allied bombing in 1945.

Zunes: Israel’s invasion of Lebanon in 2006 was largely at the behest of the George W. Bush administration, which pushed the Israeli government against the better judgement of its military leadership to attempt to neutralize Hezbollah at a time when the United States was seriously considering war with Iran. By heavily damaging Hezbollah’s arsenal of sophisticated Iranian missiles, they hoped to weaken Iran’s deterrent against a U.S./Israeli attack. When it became clear to the Israelis that the war was not going as planned, the Bush administration pushed them to continue fighting despite disastrous results. By contrast, the Biden administration, despite its strong support for Israel’s war on Gaza, appears much less willing to support an Israeli war on Lebanon or a U.S. war on Iran. Biden would like to be able to shift attention away from his unpopular policies in the Middle East in an election year and, in the grander scheme of things, would like to refocus U.S. strategic priorities towards East Asia and not be distracted by endless Middle East wars. As a result, the U.S. would likely discourage Israel from launching another front.

Israel seems to be losing steam in its long-standing policy of “maintaining deterrence.” It’s not working well. Is Netanyahu feeling any pressure in your view. Does he fear that his form of reactionary statism is faltering?

Davidson: Israel has its own internal divisions which were moving the country in an autocratic direction even before October 7. These have to do with the degree of religiosity that might be forced on the Israeli Jewish population by their own religious right wing (which is politically aligned with Netanyahu). That same right wing is driving the settler movement and the genocide in Gaza. If Netanyahu can sustain his present alliance the reactionary statism will persist. In the end almost all Israeli Jews are more hostile toward the Palestinians than they are to each other, despite sectarian differences.

Zunes: Even putting aside the moral and legal arguments, Netanyahu’s policies have been quite harmful to Israel’s security interests. Since 2002, every Arab state has pledged recognition and security guarantees in return for the end of the occupation, but Israel has refused to do so. Israel’s ongoing repression and colonization of the West Bank and its refusal to allow for the emergence of a viable Palestinian state was directly responsible for the rise of Hamas and the horrific terrorist attacks of October 7. Unfortunately, U.S. policy of rewarding Israel for its intransigence by dramatically increasing military aid, abusing its veto power at the United Nations to protect the Netanyahu government and attacking the international judicial system for its effort to seek accountability for war crimes has given Israelis the sense that they can go as far to the right as they want without suffering the consequences. Israel does what it does not because it is uniquely evil but because it has the protection of the world’s most powerful nation. This is worsened by the demographic reality that with right-wing, religious, ultra-nationalist Israelis tending to have large families and secular left-leaning Israelis tending to have small families, the Israeli public is now well to the right of what it was a generation ago.

Can you comment on historical relations between Israel and Lebanon, especially the brutal 1982 war, and its connection with Palestine?

Davidson: We must start in 1947-48 with the Nakba. When the Zionists waged war against the Palestinians, they pushed most of them into the neighboring countries. The refugees almost immediately engaged in acts of resistance using Lebanon, Jordan and Syria as bases. This eventually brought them into conflict with the local governments (which sought to avoid Israeli counter attacks) and, in the case of Jordan and Syria, the Palestinian attacks were eventually brought under control. Lebanon’s government was, however, too weak to accomplish this and so the PLO [Palestine Liberation Organization] set up shop in the south of that country and periodically launched cross border acts of resistance. At the same time a civil war broke out in Lebanon between Christian and Muslim factions.

In 1982, in alliance with the Maronite Christian faction, Israel invaded Lebanon and occupied the south of the country. They forced the PLO fighters out (they went to Tunisia) and destroyed most of western Beirut (a preview of what they are doing to Gaza today). It is at this time that the Shiite paramilitary force that would evolve into Hezbollah was formed. It would eventually force an Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon (by virtue of a guerrilla war of attrition) and become one of the most powerful of Lebanese factions, participating in the government.

There seems to be a certain inevitability to all these events, set off by the Zionist colonization of Palestine. The Zionists like to think of their taking of Palestine as akin to the colonization of the American continent — the part that became the U.S. But the analogy is wrong because the consciousness of many has changed. In the case of the U.S., the taking and settling of the land was accomplished by overwhelming force at a time when the Western world had no real consciousness of human and civil rights — especially for “racial inferiors.” Today, the Israelis and their Western allies exist in a different “moral” world wherein popular anti-racist and anti-imperialist sentiment within democratic cultures greatly complicate their strategic goals and tactical policies.

However (there always seems to be a however), it should be noted that the West is also suffering from a political shift to the right and so it is an open question if present “moral” considerations will be enough to see the Palestinians through to some just end to their struggle. If not, we will find ourselves back in a barbaric age with little concern for human and civil rights, led by populist far right leaders, and a lot of loose nuclear weapons.

 

On Aid and War – How Israel Has Used Starvation To Subdue the Palestinians

Ramzy Barou/ Antiwar

Humanitarian aid should never be politicized though, quite often, the very survival of nations is used as political bargaining chips.

Sadly, Gaza remains a prime example. Even before the current war, the Gaza Strip suffered under a 17-year hermetic blockade, which has rendered the impoverished area virtually ‘unlivable’.

That very term, ‘unlivable’ was used by the then-UN Special Rapporteur for the Situation of Palestine, Michael Lynk, in 2018.

As of mid-December, “nearly 70% of Gaza’s 439,000 homes and about half of its buildings have been damaged or destroyed”, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing experts who conducted a thorough analysis of satellite data.

As tragic as the situation was in December, now it is far worse.

67 percent of Gaza’s water, sanitation facilities and infrastructure have been destroyed or damaged, according to a statement by the United Nations Agency for Palestinian Refugees, UNRWA, on June 19, leading to the spreading of infectious diseases, which has ravaged the beleaguered population for months.

The spread of disease is also linked to the accumulation of garbage everywhere in Gaza. Earlier, the refugees agency reported that “as of June 9, over 330,000 tons of waste have accumulated in or near populated areas across Gaza, posing catastrophic environmental (and) health risks”.

The situation was already disastrous. Indeed, three years before the war, the Global Institute for Water, Environment and Health (GIWEH) said, in a joint statement with the Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor, that 97 percent of Gaza water was undrinkable and unfit for human consumption.

Yet, so far, any conversation on allowing aid to Gaza, or the rebuilding of Gaza after the war, has been placed largely within political contexts.

By shutting down all border crossings, including the Egypt-Gaza Rafah Crossing – which, on June 17, was set ablaze – Israel has politicized food, fuel and medicine as tools in its war in the Strip.

This is not a mere inference, but the actual statement made by Israeli Minister of Defense, Yoav Gallant, who on October 9, declared that he had ordered a “complete siege” and that “there will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, no water” entering Gaza.

The timing of the statement, which has indeed been put into action from the first day of the war, suggests that Israel did not apply the strategy as a last resort. It was one of the most important pieces in the war stratagem, which remains in effect to this day.

Instead of pressuring Israel, Washington tried to obtain its own political leverage, also by politicizing aid. On March 3, the US Air Force started airdropping aid into northern Gaza. A far more conducive and less humiliating option for Palestinians, however, would have been direct US pressure on Israel to allow access to aid trucks arriving through Rafah, Karem Abu Salem Crossing or any other.

Scenes and images of thousands of starving Palestinians chasing after boxes of aid parachuted in Gaza will remain etched in the collective memory of humanity as an example of our failed morality.

News reports spoke of whole families who were killed under the weight of the dropped ‘aid’, much of which had fallen in the Mediterranean, never to be retrieved.

Even the Gaza pier, constructed by the US military on the Gaza shore last month, did little to alleviate the situation. It merely transported 137 aid trucks, according to the US’ own estimation, enough to cover Gaza’s need for food for a few hours only.

During the years of siege, an average of 500 trucks arriving daily in Gaza has kept the 2.3 million population of the Strip alive, though malnourished.

To deal with the outcome of the war, and to stave off current starvation, especially in the north, the number of aid trucks would have to be much higher. Yet, whole days would pass without a single truck making its way to the suffering population. This is unacceptable.

Not only did the international community fail at ending the war, it has also failed in delinking humanitarian aid from political and military objectives.

The problem with politicizing aid is that innocent civilians become a bargaining chip for politicians and military men. This goes against the very foundation of international humanitarian law.

According to the International Red Cross, citing the Hague Conventions, “international humanitarian law is the branch of international law that seeks to impose limits on the destruction and suffering caused by armed conflict.” In Gaza, no such ‘limits’ have been ‘imposed’ by anyone.

Providing aid to Gaza and ensuring the reconstruction of the Strip must not be a political item for negotiations. It is a basic human right that must be honored under any circumstance.

Meaningful pressure must be placed on Israel to end the Gaza siege, and urgent plans must be drafted, starting today, by representatives of UN humanitarian institutions, the Arab League and Palestinian and Gaza authorities to be the entities responsible for delivering aid to Gaza.

Humanitarian aid to Gaza must not be used as political leverage, or a tool in a cruel war, whose primary victims are millions of Palestinian civilians.

 

The Samson Option: Israel’s plan to nuke its opponents

Arvind Dilawar/ MROnline

On September 22, 1979, U.S. surveillance satellite “Vela 6911” detected a double flash of light in the Indian Ocean midway between Africa and Antarctica that appeared to be consistent with the detonation of a nuclear weapon. As researchers with the Federation of American Scientists (FAS) note in their paper, “Israeli Nuclear Weapons, 2021,” U.S. intelligence at the time of “the Vela incident” believed the double flash to be an Israeli nuclear test, conducted with logistical support from the Apartheid-era South African government. A panel assembled by President Jimmy Carter, however, rejected this conclusion based on a premise that the Administration knew to be false, but did not want to challenge politically—that Israel did not possess nuclear weapons.

Israeli “nuclear ambiguity,” its lack of official confirmation or denial that it possesses nuclear weapons, persists to this day. Nevertheless, as of 2021, researchers estimate that the country possesses ninety nuclear warheads, capable of being delivered by aircraft, land-based ballistic missiles, and sea-based cruise missiles. Israel is reserving these weapons for “the Samson Option”: an all-out assault on the civilian population centers of its opponents.

Researchers have been able to reconstruct the history and current status of Israel’s nuclear program through declassified materials, as well as statements by Israeli politicians and officers themselves.

“Israeli officials do not explicitly discuss the country’s nuclear doctrine, but the country still needs to implicitly signal the circumstances under which it would use nuclear weapons for deterrence purposes,” says Kelsey Davenport, director of nonproliferation policy at the Arms Control Association, which advocates for nuclear disarmament.

Reading between the lines of statements from former and current officials and military planners provides insights into how the country may use its nuclear weapons, such as the Samson Option.

In 1999, Israeli-American historian Avner Cohen published Israel and the Bomb, which relied on recently declassified documents from archives in Israel and the United States to piece together the process by which the government of Israeli Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion colluded with or deceived U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower, French Prime Minister Guy Mollet, and Norwegian Prime Minister Einar Gerhardsen to begin construction of a nuclear reactor in the late 1950s. Ben-Gurion’s government first denied the reactor’s existence, then insisted on its peaceful purposes in scientific research and energy production—all while intending to produce weapons-grade plutonium. Israel may have assembled its first nuclear weapon as early as 1967. It remains the only country in the Middle East with nuclear weapons.

The ambiguity around Israel’s nuclear arsenal also extends to its nuclear doctrine, or the circumstances under which it would choose to deploy nuclear weapons. A previous report from the FAS describes a key component of Israel’s nuclear doctrine as “the Samson Option,” a reference to the biblical figure Samson, who killed himself and his enemies by collapsing the pillars of the temple in which they all stood. The Samson Option similarly invokes murder-suicide, threatening any force that successfully defeats Israel’s conventional military with nuclear retaliation.

“Israel’s policy of never formally acknowledging its nuclear arsenal makes its doctrine ambiguous, but the Samson Option is believed to refer to Israel’s plans for overwhelming nuclear retaliation against non-nuclear adversaries if the country faces an imminent, existential threat,” says Davenport.

It would likely include deliberate, disproportionate nuclear strikes against non-military targets, such as cities, despite the clear violation of international humanitarian law.

The Samson Option stands in contrast to doctrines embraced by other nuclear powers, such as “Mutually Assured Destruction” (MAD). Developed during the Cold War, MAD posits that nuclear powers like the United States and the Soviet Union could deter each other from ever using nuclear weapons through the threat of retaliatory strikes—that is, if one nuked the other, the other would nuke back, meaning neither would survive. Unlike MAD, Israel’s Samson Option specifically threatens its non-nuclear opponents.

“MAD is designed to deter war or prevent war from escalating to nuclear use,” explains Davenport.

The Samson Option is not designed to deter a nuclear adversary from a first strike or counter strike—Israel is the only nuclear-armed state in the region. Rather, its purported purpose is to ensure Israel’s survival. Under the Samson Option, nuclear weapons would be deliberately used against a non-nuclear adversary as a last resort to prevent an Israeli defeat.

The events of October 7, as well as the ongoing Israeli genocide in Gaza, reveal the dangers of Israel’s nuclear doctrine. On October 7, conventionally armed Palestinian militants were able to successfully overwhelm defenses at multiple points of the militarized border wall constructed by Israel around Gaza. The Palestinian militants advanced under a barrage of rockets fired from Gaza into Israel—one of which struck an Israeli military base housing nuclear-capable missiles, according to an analysis by The New York Times.

Even after the Israeli military managed to repel the Palestinian militants, at least one Israeli politician called for the use of nuclear weapons against Gaza, as reported by the Associated Press and others. Therefore, the true ambiguity that now remains is not whether Israel possesses nuclear weapons, but how those weapons might be used.

“Israel’s nuclear arsenal does not protect the state against conventional strikes, particularly from non-state actors,” says Davenport.

Furthermore, the irresponsible rhetoric of Israeli politicians threatening to use nuclear weapons against Gaza erodes the taboo against nuclear use and underscores the critical importance of redoubling efforts to reduce nuclear risk and work toward disarmament.