The Israeli escalation ladder

..and a summary of the main events this week.

As I have been quite inactive this week, apart from one translation on Wednesday 9th October 2024, today I will provide a summary of more recent and less recent events to show how Little Satan (a.k.a. Israel) has slowly but surely escalated the situation in Lebanon and in the wider Middle East region.

Cartoon by Bas van der Schot, De Volkskrant, Netherlands.

Since 7th October 2023 and until 31st March 2024, Little Satan was mostly focussed on Gaza and, partially, on the West Bank, with skirmishes with Hezbollah across the border with Lebanon and occasional tit-for-tats with the Houthis in Yemen.

Little Satan decided to start climbing the “escalation ladder” only on 1st April 2024, when it hit Iran’s consulate in Damascus (Syria) with an airstrike, causing the death of several people, including five Iranian officials plus Mohammad Reza Zahedi, a senior commander in the elite Quds Force of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), and his deputy, Sardar Haji Rahimi, as I reported in this article.

After the legitimate Iranian response two weeks later with dozen of drones and missiles (“Operation True Promise”), Little Satan reacted launching a limited attack against Iran on 19th April 2024, after which the situation seemed to calm down, if we assume that the death of the late Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi in an helicopter crash was an accident and not a Mossad operation (in the end Iran blamed the weather for the incident).

On 28th July 2024 Little Satan blamed Hezbollah for a missile/rocket strike in the village of Majdal Shams (with a majority of Druze Syrians) in the occupied Syrian Golan Heights, something that Hezbollah strongly denied (it has always admitted responsibility for accidental strikes), as I reported in this other article: most likely it was an Israeli false flag to get a casus belli against Hezbollah.

In fact, just two days later, on 30th July 2024, Little Satan bombed a residential building in Beirut, the Lebanese capital, just to kill Fuad Shukr, a senior Hezbollah commander allegedly responsible for the deadly rocket attack on Majdal Shams, as I reported here. As if that was not enough, the day after (31st July 2024), Little Satan carried out the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh, the late Hamas Political Bureau Chief, in Tehran, which I covered here.

While Iran did not respond to the killing of Haniyeh (until a few days ago), Hezbollah ramped up its attacks, which reached their climax with “Operation Arbaeen” on 25th August 2024, to avenge Fuad Shukr.

At this point Little Satan decided to escalate even further, first carrying out a terrorist operation with the explosion of pagers, walkie-talkies and other electronic devices on 17th and 18th September 2024, as I reported here and here, and then, from 19th September 2024, with airstrikes across southern Lebanon, to which Hezbollah responded with a barrage of rockets on 22nd September 2024, targeting Israeli military bases in Haifa and Tabarayya (Tiberias).

The day after Little Satan intensified the airstrikes in southern Lebanon, while Hezbollah, unimpressed, kept pounding the occupied Palestinian territories, as I reported in this article, finally targeting Mossad headquarters in Tel Aviv with a Qader 1 ballistic missile on 25th September 2024 (see this article).

Then, on 27th September 2024, the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu, while in New York for the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), decided to decapitate Hezbollah’s cadre, including its Secretary-General, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, by dropping bunker-busting bombs in Beirut, as I reported here. Rumour has it that Bibi may have set up a trap, with the complicity of the Outlaw US Empire and possibly France, by offering a 21-day ceasefire to Hezbollah, whose cadre then gathered in Beirut to discuss it and, then once a mole warned Bibi about the gathering, he authorized the airstrike - check this article by Finian Cunningham on Strategic Culture to read the whole story.

Bibi probably thought that this would have marked the end of Hezbollah. Instead, rocket strikes from Lebanon have continued unrelenting (click here for an overview of Hezbollah’s operations today and here for comments from Israeli soldiers and international observers), despite continuous bombing of southern Lebanon and its capital, Beirut. So, he had to carry out a new invasion of Lebanon, but with no luck so far, actually sustaining serious losses, as reported in this Al Mayadeen article.

Not only that, but on 1st October 2024 Iran finally decided to respond to the killing of Haniyeh and Nasrallah with “Operation True Promise 2”, firing ~200 ballistic missiles, most of which were not intercepted and hit their intended, despite western mainstream media (MSM)/propaganda claim otherwise.

Since then, there have been discussions between Great Satan (a.k.a. the Outlaw US Empire) and Little Satan about how to retaliate against Iran: hitting nuclear sites, oil fields, something else? - On this topic I recommend this post by Richard Silverstein on his Tikun Olam blog.

Meanwhile, probably scared by the Iranian operation and afraid of the repercussion of a wider regional war on their economy, on 3rd October 2024, the Gulf Arab states “sought to reassure Iran of their neutrality in Iran-Israel conflict”, as reported by Reuters.

In my last original article a week ago I speculated an Israeli response to the latest Iranian missile barrage was imminent, but it has not materialized yet. To understand why, let’s have a look at the events from this week.

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The announcement of suspension of flights across Iran for nine hours in the night between Sunday 6th and Monday 7th October 2024 suggested that Iran may have had advanced knowledge of an impending Israeli attack, however the suspension was lifted just a few hours after the initial announcement. Maybe Iranian warnings and last-minute behind-the-scene negotiations averted the Israeli revenge?

Yet, fiery statements followed up on the following days, with Iranian Foreign Minister, Abbas Araghchi, stating on Tuesday 8th October 2024 that…

Iran’s response will not be necessarily reciprocation at the same level of the Israelis’ action, but it may be harsher and aim for different targets that would intensify the effectiveness of the response.

…as reported by The Guardian, while Benjamin Netnyahu threatened Lebanon with the same fate as Gaza (again from The Guardian):

You have an opportunity to save Lebanon before it falls into the abyss of a long war that will lead to destruction and suffering like we see in Gaza.

I say to you, the people of Lebanon: Free your country from Hezbollah so that this war can end.

By the way, around that date increasingly well-founded speculations started to emerge about the implementation of the controversial “Generals’ Plan”, proposed by retired Israeli Major General Giora Eiland, which I briefly touched upon in this article. The plan calls for the total siege of the northern Gaza Strip, starvation as a weapon of war, and the forced evacuation of the native Palestinian population, with the aim of eliminating all forms of resistance and opposition within the area. In fact, the day before, the Israeli army announced the expansion of the so-called “humanitarian zone” in Al-Mawasi and the opening of two main evacuation corridors - Salah al-Din Road and al-Rashid Street - to push the residents of northern Gaza southwards. Since then Little Satan has begun the occupation of several strategic areas, such as Jabalia (see for instance this snippet from The Guardian today), with the aim of emptying the entire northern part of the Strip. Yesterday Al Mayadeen reported that Little Satan “has blocked fuel deliveries, leaving hospitals in critical condition”, with Jabalia under siege for a week; Gaza's Civil Defense spokesperson, Mahmoud Basal, was quoted as saying (emphasis mine):

The residents in northern Gaza are suffering from a severe shortage of all basic needs — there is no water, no food, and no medicine.

…and today the UN World Food Program has confirmed that since 1st October no food aid has entered North Gaza, where at least 400,000 people are trapped, according to Philippe Lazzarini, commissioner general of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA).

On Wednesday 9th October 2024, Iran gave a stern warning to Gulf Arab states, with a senior Iranian official quoted by Reuters as saying (emphasis mine):

Iran made it clear that any action by a Persian Gulf country against Tehran, whether through the use of airspace or military bases, will be regarded by Tehran as an action taken by the entire group, and Tehran will respond accordingly.

The message emphasised the need for regional unity against Israel and the importance of securing stability.

It also made clear that any assistance to Israel, such as allowing the use of a regional country’s airspace for actions against Iran, is unacceptable.

…while the Iranian Foreign Minister was visiting Saudi Arabia and other countries in the region, as per Reuters, probably to deliver the same message in person.

Later on the same day Benjamin Netanyahu held a 50-minute call with Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, respectively President and Vice-President of the Outlaw US Empire, as reported by The Guardian, however the content of the phone call was not disclosed, but, soon after that, the Israeli “Defense” Minister, Yoav Gallant, released the following statement, while speaking to his troops and referring to the upcoming attack against Iran:

Our attack will be lethal, precise and above all surprising. They will not understand what happened and how it happened.

On Thursday 10th October 2024 Abu Ali al-Askari, head of the Iraqi Hezbollah Brigades Security Bureau, warned that “any targeting of the country or use of its territory or airspace to strike Iran will not be limited to ‘Israel’ but will extend to US bases and interests in Iraq and the region”, adding that, if a war that involves the energy sector breaks out, then “the world will lose 12 million barrels per day”, as reported by Al Mayadeen, which quoted Abu Ali al-Askari as saying:

This is what we will be taking care of, but only God knows what our brethren in Yemen will do in Bab al-Mandab and our brethren in Iran will do in the Strait of Hormuz.

In practice, he warned that no oil would flow from the Gulf States to the rest of the world, if a war between Israel an Iran erupted, something that would accelerate exponentially the hegemony of the Outlaw US Empire.

This and the Iranian warnings the day before must have had the intended effect because, on the same day, Al Mayadeen and The Guardian reported that some of the Gulf states, namely Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar, are now refusing to allow Israeli fighters and bombers to fly over their airspace for any attack on Iran and urged Great Satan to stop his “little brother” from attacking Iranian oil sites to avoid retaliation on their oil fields.

On the same day, as reported in this Al Mayadeen article, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi wrote a letter addressed to foreign ministers worldwide saying:

The unlimited impunity Israel enjoys has made the regime expand its attacks on Lebanon, including massive airstrikes on residential areas using US-made bunker-buster bombs.

If necessary, the Islamic Republic of Iran is fully prepared to take more and stronger defensive measures against any aggressive action and will not hesitate in this regard.

In the same article, Al Mayadeen, citing Bloomberg (paywalled), reported that Joe Biden warned Little Satan not to attack Iran's nuclear installations and that US officials are obviously worried that an assault on the country's energy infrastructure may destabilize energy markets; for this reason, Great Satan advanced alternative options, such as new sanctions against Iran, if its little brother does not attack Iran.

The last couple of days have also seen several sites of UNIFIL (United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon) on the so-called “Blue Line” (the border between Lebanon and Israel) being deliberately shelled by the Israeli “Defense” Forces (IDF), resulting in the injury of 5 peacekeepers, as of today (source: The Guardian) - see also these two Al Mayadeen articles (1 and 2). Previously the IDF asked UNIFIL to move away from its positions (see for instance this RTE article), but, as a peacekeeping force, it did not and now the IDF has tried to dislodge them by brute force, first by moving around their outposts to attract Hezbolalh fire on them, so that Little Satan could blame Hezbollah, then by firing directly on them. Yet UNIFIL still rightly refuses to move.

If you are questioning the usefulness of UNIFIL, please bear in mind that, according to international law, they can fire only in case of self-defense, though apparently this has not happened (yet?!). You may think that UNIFIL is not doing anything to prevent escalation, but, actually, just by staying there, it is hindering and slowing down the advance of Israeli troops in Lebanon, which is exactly the reason why UNIFIL was deployed there. Please read this UN explainer for more info about UNIFIL.

Now there have been very strong reactions by several countries, including Italy, Ireland, Spain, France and even the Outlaw US Empire, however, apart from the usual rhetoric, nobody does nothing concrete (i.e. stopping the flow of weapons and ammunition to Israel and imposing sanctions against it), as you can read from the aforementioned Al Mayadeen articles and elsewhere. For instance: both Italian and French governments have summoned the Israeli ambassadors for a rebuke and demanding explanations and investigations, but they are still keeping diplomatic ties with the terrorist country, whereas US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin just “urged the Israeli Security Minister to ensure the safety of UNIFIL forces in Lebanon”. And tonight 40 countries “have signed a joint statement reaffirming the protection of UNIFIL peacekeepers in Lebanon and condemning the latest attacks against them”… good, but what’s the point of it, if it still leaves Little Satan unchecked? And, by the way, was it fine when it was “just” mauling Palestinians and the Lebanese people or UNRAW workers or the volunteers of NGOs (Non-Governmental Organizations)?

As Craig Murray and Jonathan Cook recently wrote on their latest articles (which I invite you to read), there are just no red lines for Little Satan: it can commit any war crime and crime against humanity, knowing that it will never be punished, because it has its back covered by Great Satan, the Outlaw US Empire, which, thanks to its veto power, can stop any binding resolution against it at the United Nations Security Council (UNSC). and is slowing down the prosecutions at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and at the International Criminal Court (ICC).

Mind that Little Satan would not be able to carry out its attack without the complicity and political, economic and military support of Great Satan, i.e. the Outlaw US Empire and its vassal states, without its jets, its bombs, etc.

I will conclude this long article with the admission of US State Department spokesperson, Matthew Miller, that “US never wanted a diplomatic resolution with Hamas”, i.e. it has always bought time for Israel to carry out its genocide of Palestinians in Gaza:

Have you understood who is running the show?

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