Israel has launched fresh and intensified attacks on Hezbollah in Lebanon, delivering a blow to attempts to end the US war with Iran and killing 11.
It happened as Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf warned of strikes against US oil and gas companies threatening revenge attacks. He was responding to US weekend strikes on Iranian tankers which followed attacks on the American navy by Iranian troops.
Iran's warning over US oil and gas
Ghalibaf said: “It’s simple: the oil and gas production chain here is sprawling, accessible, and exposed. American oil and gas companies across these waters and facilities share that exposure. Strike our assets and you get struck.”
The latest Israeli attacks focused on southern Lebanon as Israel warned residents to evacuate certain areas.
Israel's strikes on southern Lebanon
They warned they were targeting a “Hezbollah facility,” and later the foreign ministry said in a statement: “Repeated drone attacks. Weapons storage. Terror infrastructure. Command centres embedded in civilian areas.
“Hezbollah continues attempting to rebuild its military capabilities in southern Lebanon. These violations will not be accepted.”
Overnight strikes hit the southern village of Kfar Rumman and among the dead were children. Locals claimed the Israeli army released no warning before the strikes on Kfar Rumman but issued an evacuation order for Deir Zahrani 22 minutes before destroying a building there.
Link to the US war on Iran
Attacks between Israel and Hezbollah are inextricably linked to the US war on Iran, since Tehran sponsors and arms Lebanese Hezbollah.
There have been repeated attempts by Iran to re-supply Hezbollah with smuggled arms and other military aid since the group was depleted by Israeli attacks.
Since the October 7 2023 Hamas horror attacks on southern Israel, which killed more than 1,200 men, women and children, Israel has killed up to 5,000 Hezbollah operatives including commanders and troops and wounded 13,000.
Almost 77,000 Gazan Palestinians have been killed in the Palestinian Strip since the October 7 attacks and the war is ongoing.
US nuclear deal doubts
Over the weekend US Energy Secretary, Chris Wright, admitted the US war on Iran may not soon achieve its primary aim, saying “there may not” be a nuclear deal.
Instead, he said US strikes may continue as a method of holding back Iran’s progression towards nuclear proliferation.
He said: “It may be simply destroying their capabilities to do it.” And he added: “They don’t have the capability to build more missiles. We’re degrading their capacity to develop nuclear weapons and, ultimately, to deliver them if they develop them.”
But he also admitted that a nuclear deal may not be in place with Iran until another regime takes over, saying: “An agreement may await the next administration in Iran. We simply don’t know that.”
