 |
|
Ha'aretz: Rocket fired from Lebanon hits central Haifa. No reported casualties. Hezbollah denied firing it. Israeli ambassador tells reporters in Washington strike represents major escalation by Hezbollah:
In another report, Ha'aretz intel correspondent Amos Harel reports that Israel fears Hezbollah will move the captured Israeli soldiers to Iran.The Israel Defense Forces confirmed that several rockets landed some 15 kilometers south of the border with Lebanon on Thursday morning, signaling that Hezbollah is becoming increasingly successful in expanding the reach of the crude projectiles. This is the furthest that Hezbollah rockets have managed to penetrate inside Israel.
Hezbollah has declared it has over 10,000 rockets to use against Israel.
The government is working on the assumption that Hezbollah will use rockets with a longer range than they have previously had to strike civilians areas in Israel. Should that happen, the IDF will then consider sending ground troops into Lebanon.
"Israeli concerns that the soldiers might be moved out of Lebanon are a prime reason for its efforts to blockade the country and prevent air traffic, [a senior Israeli foreign ministry official Gideon] Meir said later," the NYT reports. Israel hit all three runways and fuel storage tankers at Beirut international airport, "two Lebanese Army bases, Hezbollah’s Al Manar television station and ... the main highway between Beirut and Damascus, Syria," and imposed a naval blockade on Lebanon. "The Lebanese government said 53 Lebanese had died since Wednesday."
A source who runs a Beirut-based dialogue with groups including Hezbollah says that the timing of the abduction yesterday was not planned in advance, but was more a target of opportunity. "It is not as if they chose today to do it," emailed Mark Perry, of Conflicts Forum. "Hezballah continually monitors the Israeli border to determine Israeli vulnerabilities. This morning, Israel's guard was down, and Hezballah moved. Why this morning? It would be better to ask Israel. The internal Israeli debate on this is not about Hezballah, but why was it that this morning, of all mornings, they screwed up. It is just the way it turned out... If it had been the case four weeks ago, they would have done it four weeks ago."
"God help us," he adds.
A colleague at the lunch with Israeli ambassador Ayalon today says it was all "Iran, Iran, Iran."
As Sy Hersh said at a talk today, and I'm paraphrasing, sometimes big wars get started almost by accident. He also said based on conversations with his Israeli and Lebanese sources this morning, that Israel's goal may be more limited -- carving out a 20 - 25 mile buffer or free fire zone into southern Lebanon, to prevent Hezbollah from striking into Israel.
Update: Ha'aretz's Ze'ev Schiff: "Syria: A Possible Third Front." More from Marc Perelman, and Jefferson Morley.
A colleague knowledgeable about the region writes, "I have a hard time believing it can get much worse, mostly because of the imbalance of power, even if Israel decides to strike a few targets in Syria. I think there will be a lot of calls for the US to step in and do more than issue statements, dispatch Condi or something... The administration has a big dilemma with Lebanon because they support the government which Israel is accusing of the violence ... The Israelis claim this is all planned by Iran and Syria via Hamas and Hezbollah. And the fact is that both groups have said that they were not responding to the recent killing of civilians in Gaza but that their elaborate kidnapping plots were in the works for months, which the Israelis claim dates to a summit between Assad and Ahmadinejad in Damascus in January. This might be a little too neat but expect the drumbeat against Tehran's terrorism sponsoring to escalate as the nuke issue heats up..."