According to the AP, the IDF took out most of the Hezbullah front-line rocket positions during the bombardment yesterday.
Israel destroyed most of the military positions of the Lebanese Hezbollah along the northern border, in the heaviest fighting since it withdrew its troops from southern Lebanon six years ago, the IDF’s northern division commander said Monday.
The Sunday rocket and artillery exchanges killed two Hezbollah guerrillas and wounded two Israeli soldiers. The cross-border fighting began when Hezbollah fired Katyusha rockets from Lebanon at Israel’s northern Galilee region, hitting an air force base, then attacked Israeli outposts along the border.
“Our main effort was to destroy the frontline that Hezbollah has built in the last six years,” Colonel Gal Hirsch said, adding the pro-Iranian group had established dozens of frontline outposts along the border with Israel.
“We destroyed most of them,” he told the Associated Press in a telephone interview.
I’m certainly glad they did. But of course, Iran is supplying its proxy army (which include Islamic Revolutionary Guards direct from Iran) with even more dangerous rockets.
Iran has equipped the Lebanese-based radical Islamic group Hezbollah with long-range rockets capable of hitting targets up to 200 kilometers away, putting all of Israel’s major urban centers – including the southern city of Be’er Sheva – within striking distance.
The solid-fuel rockets lack an independent guidance system and their accuracy is questionable but they can still cause considerable damage.
According to intelligence estimates, the rockets are meant to strike non-specific areas, such as towns and cities, and carry a warhead estimated to weigh 600 kilograms. This latest development doubles the range of weapons previously in Hezbollah’s arsenal.
This is in direct violation of UN Resolution 1559, which calls for the disbandment of Iranian militias (that means you, Hezbhullah). But as we know, UN Resolutions are meant to be ignored, unless they are directed at Israel (and especially the non-binding ones, which by some mystical power become binding if directed at Israel).
The reason for the hurried cease-fire? Apparently, Israel threatened to bomb Beirut if the rockets didn’t stop. That got Condi’s attention pretty damn quick.
After various attempts, including efforts by Lebanese intelligence, which held discussions with the Hizbullah leadership, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, and Islamic Jihad , failed, Saad Hariri, son of former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Hariri, intervened directly. Hariri today heads the anti-Syrian camp. He spoke with the Hizbullah leadership a number of times, we well as with European and international sources.
These talks succeeded in the end in finding an agreement that a ceasefire between the sides would begin at 5:17 p.m. exactly. It was also said that the ceasefire was only made possible after a direct intervention by the UN Security Council and the US Secretary of State. Lebanese newspaper al-Nahar said that after Israel threatened to bomb Beirut if the Katyusha rockets continued, Rice directly intervened through the American embassy in Lebanon.
Yeah, I’ll bet she did.
This battle is over, but war is coming. Iran is going to attack Israel any which way it can.