Middle East & Arab World Lebanon January 2024-

Reform or Recklessness? Which Path for the Arab Region?
(Carnegie Endowment) …there is the third category of Arab states, namely failing and failed states. Lebanon, Libya, Syria, Sudan, and Yemen are all prime examples of such states. Ironically, all of them have diverse societies ethnically and religiously. But instead of realizing that diversity is a source of strength, which should result in a healthy exchange of ideas and openness of minds, these countries have allowed diversity to divide their societies, with different communities fighting or in conflict with each other, a process that is often difficult to reverse.
Lebanon offers a particularly stark example. Even though it is not presently a victim of civil war (it has gone through several already) its dysfunctional political system, characterized by corruption across the political spectrum, has led the country to economic disaster. Yet no matter how bad the situation becomes, the political elite is unwilling to do anything, including agreeing to the implementation of a much-needed International Monetary Fund reform package, preferring to ruin the country rather than give up any of its privileges. (August 2023)

14-15 February
Israeli airstrikes killed 10 Lebanese civilians in a single day. Hezbollah has vowed to retaliate
(AP) — The civilian death toll from two Israeli airstrikes in Lebanon has risen to 10, Lebanese state media reported Thursday, making the previous day the deadliest in more than four months of cross-border exchanges.
Israel’s military said it killed a senior commander with the militant Hezbollah group’s elite Radwan Force, Ali Dibs, who it says played a role in an attack inside Israel last year that unnerved Israelis, as well as other attacks directed at Israel over the past four months. It said Dibs was killed Wednesday along with his deputy Hassan Ibrahim Issa, as well as another Hezbollah operative, in a strike in the southern city of Nabatiyeh.
A look at the arsenals of Israel and Lebanon’s Hezbollah militia as cross-border strikes escalate
(AP) — The slow-simmering cross-border conflict between Lebanon’s Hezbollah militant group and Israeli forces escalated Wednesday, reviving fears that the daily clashes could expand into an all-out war.
A rocket fired from Lebanon struck the northern Israeli town of Safed, killing a 20-year-old female soldier and wounding at least eight people.
Israel responded with airstrikes that killed at least 10 people in southern Lebanon, including a Syrian woman, her two children, four members of another family and three Hezbollah fighters. At least nine people were wounded.
9 January
Israel-Hamas War: Hezbollah Says a Commander Was Killed in a Strike in Lebanon
A Lebanese security official said the commander was part of Hezbollah’s Radwan unit, which Israel says aims to infiltrate its northern border.
The death of a Hezbollah commander stokes fears of a widening war.

6-7 January
Israel’s talk of expanding war to Lebanon alarms U.S.
An American intelligence assessment found that it would be difficult for Israel to succeed in a war against Hezbollah amid ongoing fighting in Gaza
(WaPo) President Biden has dispatched his top aides to the Middle East with a critical objective: Prevent a full-blown war from erupting between Israel and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah.
Israel has made clear it views as untenable the regular exchange of fire between its forces and Hezbollah along the border and may soon launch a major military operation in Lebanon.
Israel says Hezbollah struck sensitive air traffic base in the north and warns of ‘another war’
(AP) — Hezbollah has struck an air traffic control base in northern Israel, the Israeli military said Sunday, and warned of “another war” with the Iran-backed militant group
Israel, Hezbollah trade fire across Lebanon border amid alarm over Gaza war spillover
(Reuters) – Air raid sirens sounded across northern Israel on Saturday as Lebanon’s Iranian-backed Hezbollah group said it fired rockets at Israel, and Israel said it struck a “terrorist cell” in retaliation, as top U.S. and EU diplomats visited the region seeking to keep the war from spreading.

2-3 January
Saleh al-Arouri: Hamas leader’s death ‘won’t go unpunished’, says Hezbollah chief
(BBC) Hasan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah, says the killing of Hamas’s powerful deputy leader will “not go unpunished”.
Saleh al-Arouri died in a drone attack in Beirut on Tuesday. Israel has not confirmed it was responsible.
Mr Nasrallah described Arouri’s death as a “major, dangerous crime about which we cannot be silent”.
He added that if Israel wages war on Lebanon “there will be no ceilings, no rules” to Hezbollah’s response.
Mossad chief says Israel is committed to finding and killing all Hamas leaders
Comments by David Barnea follow assassination of Hamas deputy political chief Saleh al-Arouri in Lebanon
Israel has not formally accepted responsibility for the strike in a southern Beirut suburb that killed Saleh al-Arouri, the deputy political chief of Hamas.
Senior Hamas figure Saleh al-Arouri killed in Lebanon
Death of Arouri in Israeli drone strike on Beirut suburb threatens significant escalation of war in region