Israel had built a wall on the Lebanon border and is going after tunnels that Hezbollah has built. To me these could be necessary defensive preparations for a mission north of the border. Is that what Israel is planning?
In that light, this is interesting:
Senior Israeli military officers are flying to Moscow to update their Russian counterparts about an operation launched last week to "expose and thwart" Hezbollah tunnels burrowed under Israel's border with Lebanon.
The Israeli military issued a statement Monday saying the officers would depart Tuesday "to provide an update regarding Operation Northern Shield and other operational issues."
Israelis have talked about moving north to take out the starting point of tunnels as their Northern Shield mission proceeds inside Israel to take out the tunnels. I wonder if that is the way to ease Israeli troops over the border before the real strike north begins.
That would provide a reasonable excuse for clearing lanes for crossing the border without telegraphing an invasion if that engineering preparation work was done without a good cover story.
And I have to ask if a mere tunnel operation in southern Lebanon is sufficiently kinetic to bring the Russians into for a briefing? To me, the Israelis would only brief the Russians on the scope of an operation that would get near to Russian red lines--like crossing into Syria.
And there is this complication:
The Lebanese army has strengthened its troops’ presence on the country’s southern border town of Meiss Ej Jabal in light of Israel’s recent actions near the United Nations-demarcated Blue Line between the two countries, Lebanon’s National News Agency (NNA) reported yesterday.
I criticized Israel's 2006 air campaign for needlessly inflicting losses on Lebanon when the real mission is to harm the sub-state actor Hezbollah. The idea that hitting Lebanese targets could pressure the weak Lebanese government into going after Hezbollah was ludicrous and counterproductive.
But if Lebanon throws forces to the border to act as a tripwire defense for Hezbollah which controls southern Lebanon, Israel will have no choice but to destroy those forces if they truly get in the way.
Unless Israel can bypass such forces the way they will need to bypass the United Nations UNIFUTILE forces in southern Lebanon, this will be uglier than it needs to be.
Or I'm wrong on this issue. Again.
UPDATE: Interesting:
Because of the newly discovered Hezbollah tunnels Israel wants the UN to openly hold Hezbollah and Iran responsible for violating the 2006 Lebanon peace deal and for continuing to prepare for another war against Israel.
Does Israel want the UN to admit Hezbollah violated the ceasefire to score pointless diplomatic points in the ant-Israel UN?
Or does Israel want to establish the legality of tearing Hezbollah a new one?
UPDATE: And note that we have a reason to back an Israeli campaign to clean up this mess.
