Drunk with power, Israel’s ‘victory’ opens the gates for war without end
People walk in the rubble of buildings in Beirut levelled on 27 September by Israeli strikes that killed Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, 29 September 2024
Lubna Masarwa writes in Middle East Eye on 30 September 2024:
The media in Israel reacted to the assassination of Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah with euphoria.
On Channel 12’s “Meet the Press”, Amit Segal and Ben Caspit raised a glass of arak to mark Nasrallah’s death. Paz Robinson, Channel 13’s reporter, distributed chocolates in Karmiel. Channel 13 is considered left wing. Channel 14’s flagship programme, The Patriots, opened with singing and celebration led by presenter Yinon Magal. Nadav Eyal wrote in Ynet:”[Nasrallah’s] assassination is an event on a regional, historic scale.”
The media’s delight was matched by politicians of left and right. Yair Golan, leader of the Democrats Party and former head of Meretz party who was once regarded as the most leftist mainstream politician in the country, was delighted with the assassination. He wrote on X: “The assassination of Nasrallah is a huge and important achievement. A new era has begun in the Middle East.”
A political spectrum that had become deeply polarised over the return of the hostages from Gaza has reunited over the victory Israel believes it has achieved in wiping out the leadership of Hezbollah. Yair Lapid, leader of the opposition, wrote: “Let all our enemies know that whoever attacks Israel will die.”
A new era?
Flush with success, the Israeli army published a video of the jets taking off from Hatzerim air base in the Negev desert, which included radio communications between an airforce commander and pilots. “You’ve delivered a show of victory here, I believe,” Major General Tomer Bar, commanding officer of the Israeli Air Force, can be heard saying in the clip distributed to journalists. “Well done. Immense pride.” A pilot responds: “We will reach everyone, everywhere.”
Nor was this enough. Haaretz reported that the Israel military were pushing to invade southern Lebanon, quoting military sources as saying they had to seize the moment of Hezbollah’s shock and disarray following the last two week’s blows, before Iran has the chance to replenish its stocks of missiles. Elsewhere it was reported that three army units, nearly 3000 men, had been dispatched to the West Bank.
War on three fronts, and Israel was winning each one of them, the whole country seemed to think. What a way to end a year of gloom and military setbacks in Gaza.
Israel thinks that a golden opportunity has been presented to it by an outgoing American president in Joe Biden, who is patently failing to restrain it. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has now defied Biden three times – on reoccupying Rafah, on accepting a ceasefire in Gaza with Hamas, and now on opening a new front in Lebanon.
And he has got away with it each time.