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<div class="header reader-header reader-show-element" dir="ltr"> <font
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href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/terrified-israel-escalates-attacks-across-region">https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/terrified-israel-escalates-attacks-across-region</a></font>
<h1 class="reader-title">"Terrified" Israel escalates attacks
across region</h1>
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<p class="node__submitted">
<span class="field field-author"><a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/people/ali-abunimah">Ali
Abunimah</a></span>
- <span class="field field-publication-date"><span
class="date-display-single"
content="2019-08-26T16:10:28+00:00">26 August 2019</span></span>
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<p>Israel is escalating its attacks across the region,
with bombing and drone raids in recent days in
Lebanon, Syria and Iraq.</p>
<p>Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri called a
suspected Israeli drone attack in Beirut over the
weekend “a threat to regional stability and an attempt
to push the situation towards further tension.”</p>
<p>Last week, US officials <a
href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/22/world/middleeast/israel-iraq-iran-airstrike.html">confirmed</a>
that Israel was responsible for a series of attacks in
Iraq on sites belonging to the Popular Mobilization
Forces.</p>
<p>The officials said that the targets included a
weapons depot near Baghdad that the Israelis claim was
being used by Iran to move weapons to Syria.</p>
<p>A Popular Mobilization Forces fighter was <a
href="https://middle-east-online.com/en/iraq-paramilitary-mourns-fighter-killed-%E2%80%98israeli-drone%E2%80%99">killed</a>
in the latest suspected Israeli attack on Sunday.</p>
<p>These are the <a
href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/22/world/middleeast/israel-iraq-iran-airstrike.html">first
known Israeli bombing raids</a> on Iraq in four
decades.</p>
<p>However Israel does not typically take responsibility
for attacks.</p>
<p>Known in Arabic as al-Hashd al-Shaabi, the Popular
Mobilization Forces is an Iranian-supported Iraqi
militia that was <a
href="https://www.militarytimes.com/flashpoints/2019/07/21/iraqi-forces-launch-anti-isis-operation-north-of-baghdad/">instrumental</a>
in the effort to defeat the Islamic State group also
known as ISIS.</p>
<p>And on Saturday Israeli warplanes <a
href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/08/hezbollah-chief-israeli-drones-lebanon-skies-190825165611883.html">attacked</a>
a site near the Syrian capital Damascus. Israel
claimed that it preempted an imminent drone attack by
Iranian forces.</p>
<p>The Lebanese resistance organization Hizballah said
however that the Israeli attack was actually against a
house used by its fighters, and two of the group’s
members were killed.</p>
<p>Israel has bombed Syria <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/omar-karmi/israel-strikes-syria-iran-target">dozens
of times</a> during the country’s civil war.</p>
<p>Then over the weekend, Lebanon <a
href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/08/israeli-drones-beirut-hezbollah-190825052725185.html">said</a>
two Israeli drones fell on its territory in a failed
attack on a Hizballah media office in the southern
suburb of Beirut.</p>
<p>On Sunday, Hizballah leader Hasan Nasrallah <a
href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/08/hezbollah-chief-israeli-drones-lebanon-skies-190825165611883.html">promised</a>
that resistance forces would shoot down any Israeli
drones that entered Lebanon and would defend the
country against Israeli raids.</p>
<p>“Hizballah will not allow such an aggression,”
Nasrallah said in a televised address. “The time when
Israeli aircraft come and bombard parts of Lebanon is
over.”</p>
<div id="file-83216">
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<blockquote data-width="550">
<p dir="ltr" lang="en">1. Thread analysing
Nasrallah's speech: This is the first time
Hizbullah has ever detailed its planned response
to Israeli aggression. Because Israel has
changed the ROEs and imposed new phase on
Lebanon, Hizbullah's response will be
three-pronged and qualitatively different</p>
— Amal Saad (@amalsaad_lb) <a
href="https://twitter.com/amalsaad_lb/status/1165672345937285122?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August
25, 2019</a></blockquote>
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<div id="file-83226">
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<blockquote data-width="550">
<p dir="ltr" lang="en">2. Most significant change
will be that Hizbullah will no longer be
constrained by domestic front. In a departure
from past practice, it will shoot down any
Israeli drones over Lebanon. It will be
impervious to any internal pressure by rivals
who oppose this preventive strategy</p>
— Amal Saad (@amalsaad_lb) <a
href="https://twitter.com/amalsaad_lb/status/1165672589584490498?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August
25, 2019</a></blockquote>
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<blockquote data-width="550">
<p dir="ltr" lang="en">3. It won't stop at
preventive measures against future drone
strikes, but will retaliate for today's attack
by destabilizing Israel's Northern border and
beyond. This could entail drone strikes it will
launch on Israel proper, that could target
military, economic or other sites</p>
— Amal Saad (@amalsaad_lb) <a
href="https://twitter.com/amalsaad_lb/status/1165672591845220352?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August
25, 2019</a></blockquote>
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<div id="file-83236">
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<blockquote data-width="550">
<p dir="ltr" lang="en">4. It will no longer
confine response to attacks on Hizbullah
fighters in Syria to Shebaa, but will attack
Israeli soldiers across Lebanon's border, or
well beyond it. This could mean ambushes of
border patrols or attacks on military bases and
installations inside Israel proper</p>
— Amal Saad (@amalsaad_lb) <a
href="https://twitter.com/amalsaad_lb/status/1165672593724268544?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August
25, 2019</a></blockquote>
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<p>In 2006, Hizballah dealt Israel a major strategic
defeat when its forces invaded the country, an attack
on Lebanon <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/tamara-nassar/how-saudi-arabia-supported-israels-2006-war-lebanon">tacitly
supported</a> by Saudi Arabia.</p>
<p>A coalition of Gulf states led by Saudi Arabia has in
recent years solidified its <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/tamara-nassar/palestinians-be-sacrificed-israel-gulf-marriage">overt
and covert alliance</a> with Israel against Iran and
its allies.</p>
<p>The Israeli attacks continued on Monday with Israeli
warplanes <a
href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/08/israel-strikes-palestinian-base-lebanon-reports-190826071121071.html">bombing</a>
a base of the <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/pflp-gc">Popular
Front for the Liberation of Palestinian-General
Command</a> in eastern Lebanon.</p>
<p>The Palestinian group, distinct from the similarly
named Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine,
has been fighting on the side of the government in
Syria’s civil war.</p>
<h2>Supporting al-Qaida</h2>
<p>There is a <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/content/why-israel-wants-iran-destroyed/27531">consistent
logic</a> to the Israeli attacks across the region:
to limit the influence of Iran and Iranian-supported
military organizations that Israel fears could
challenge its unchecked dominance of the region.</p>
<p>The Israeli strategy has been to directly or
indirectly support any enemy of Iran, including by <a
href="https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-israel-just-admitted-arming-anti-assad-syrian-rebels-big-mistake-1.6894850">arming</a>
jihadist groups in Syria <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/content/why-has-israel-embraced-al-qaidas-branch-syria/14619">linked
to al-Qaida</a>.</p>
<p>In 2016, for instance, Efraim Halevy, the former head
of Israel’s Mossad spy agency, acknowledged that
Israel was giving assistance al-Qaida-linked fighters
in Syria.</p>
<p>He <a
href="https://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/upfront/2016/05/mossad-head-israel-medical-aid-al-nusra-front-160531081744269.html">said</a>
that while the al-Qaida-affliated Nusra Front was an
enemy of Israel’s enemy Hizballah, Israel was “not
specifically targeted by al-Qaida.”</p>
<p>The US, under the Obama administration, also supplied
massive amounts of weaponry to rebel groups in Syria,
much of which ended up in the <a
href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/02/world/middleeast/cia-syria-rebel-arm-train-trump.html">hands
of al-Qaida</a> and <a
href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/isis-weapons-arsenal-included-some-purchased-u-s-government-n829201">even
ISIS</a>.</p>
<p>US weapons supplied via Saudi Arabia and the United
Arab Emirates are now reportedly <a
href="https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2019/02/middleeast/yemen-lost-us-arms/">reaching
al-Qaida affiliates</a> in Yemen.</p>
<h2>Israel “worried and scared”</h2>
<p>“In my own lifetime Israel has bombed Tunisia, Egypt,
Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Palestine, and it has
also downed a Libyan civilian airliner,” California
State University professor As’ad AbuKhalil <a
href="https://thegrayzone.com/2019/08/24/israel-bombs-iraq-escalating-violence-targeting-iran/">said</a>
last week after the US confirmed Israel had bombed
Iraq.</p>
<p>“The story of Israeli covert and overt destruction
and terrorism in the Mideast region is a very old
story,” AbuKhalil told Aaron Maté on <em>Pushback</em>.
“The only surprising thing about it is how little
coverage it gets here in the United States.”</p>
<p>AbuKhalil also accused the Iraqi government, which
still allows US occupation forces to operate freely in
the country, of downplaying the Israeli attacks.</p>
<p>“The people who defeated ISIS in Syria and Iraq were
the foes of the United States,” AbuKhalil said. “These
are the Hashd militias inside Iraq.”</p>
<p>“And in Syria it was the foes of the United States
who largely defeated ISIS,” AbuKhalil added. “So the
natives are the ones who did the actual fighting and
dying in the war against ISIS.”</p>
<p>According to AbuKhalil, Israel is “worried and
scared” because of the defeat it suffered at the hands
of Hizballah in 2006.</p>
<p>“And Israel is also terrified that maybe these
militias in Southern Iraq and the Houthis in Yemen are
going to become formidable enemies of the State of
Israel,” AbuKhalil said, referring to groups that it
is widely claimed are, like Hizballah, supported by
Iran.</p>
<p>Watch the full interview with AbuKhalil above.</p>
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