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Israel Expands War Aims to Include Returning Displaced Citizens to the North as Prospect of Hezbollah War Looms
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks during a news conference in Jerusalem, Sept. 2, 2024. Photo: Ohad Zwigenberg/Pool via REUTERS
Israel’s security cabinet has expanded its war goals to include returning displaced Israelis from the north back to their homes after they were forced to flee amid unrelenting fire from the Iran-backed terrorist organization Hezbollah in Lebanon.
The decision, which was made in a late-night meeting on Monday that extended into the early hours of Tuesday morning, was announced by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“Israel will continue to act to implement this goal,” Netanyahu said.
Since Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre across southern Israel — in which the Palestinian terrorist group murdered 1,200 people and kidnapped 251 hostages — the Jewish state’s war aims have been to return the hostages, destroy Hamas, and ensure Gaza cannot be used as a launching pad to attack Israel in the future.
On Oct. 8, Hezbollah joined Hamas’s war on Israel, pummeling northern Israeli communities almost daily with barrages of drones, rockets, and missiles from southern Lebanon, where it wields significant political and military influence. One such attack killed 12 children in the small Druze town of Majdal Shams.
About 80,000 Israelis have been forced to evacuate Israel’s north during that time due to the unrelenting attacks. Most of them have spent the past 11 months living in hotels in other areas of the country.
Israeli leaders have said they seek a diplomatic resolution to the conflict with Hezbollah along the border with Lebanon but are prepared to use large-scale military force if needed to ensure all displaced citizens can safely return to their homes. Efforts to make it safe for them to return have so far been unsuccessful, indicating a larger military conflict could be on the horizon.
“The possibility for an agreement is running out as Hezbollah continues to tie itself to Hamas, and refuses to end the conflict,” Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said on Monday in a meeting with White House Special envoy Amos Hochstein, according to a statement from his office. “Therefore, the only way left to ensure the return of Israel’s northern communities to their homes will be via military action.”
Amid escalating tensions between Israel and Hezbollah, the US has warned both sides to refrain from larger military action.
Hochstein, who was visiting Israel on Monday, told Netanyahu and Gallant in meetings that the US does not believe that a full confrontation with Lebanon will serve Israel’s interests or return the residents of the north to their homes, according to Israeli media reports. The US envoy also reportedly added that the risk of a regional war was real and that the diplomaitc resolution to ultimately end it would be similar to the ones being discussed now anyway.
However, tensions do not seem likely to lower in the near future.
On Tuesday, thousands of members of Hezbollah, including fighters and medics, were seriously when the pagers they use to communicate exploded.
A Hezbollah official, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Reuters that the detonation of the pagers was the “biggest security breach” the Iran-backed group had been subjected to in nearly a year of war with Israel.
Up to 2,750 people were injured in Lebanon due to exploding pagers, and at least eight people were killed, according to Lebanon’s minister of health.
Hezbollah blamed Israel for the explosions and vowed revenge, although the Jewish state has so far neither confirmed nor denied responsibility.
The post Israel Expands War Aims to Include Returning Displaced Citizens to the North as Prospect of Hezbollah War Looms first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Israel Says Missile Launched by Yemen’s Houthis ‘Most Likely’ Intercepted
Houthi leader Abdul-Malik al-Houthi addresses followers via a video link at the al-Shaab Mosque, formerly al-Saleh Mosque, in Sanaa, Yemen, Feb. 6, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Khaled Abdullah
The Israeli army said on Saturday that a missile fired from Yemen towards Israeli territory had been “most likely successfully intercepted,” while Yemen’s Houthi forces claimed responsibility for the launch.
Israel has threatened Yemen’s Iran-aligned Houthi movement – which has been attacking Israel in what it says is solidarity with Gaza – with a naval and air blockade if its attacks on Israel persist.
The Houthi military spokesperson Yahya Saree said the group was responsible for Saturday’s attack, adding that it fired a missile towards the southern Israeli city of Beersheba.
Since the start of Israel’s war in Gaza in October 2023, the Houthis, who control most of Yemen, have been firing at Israel and at shipping in the Red Sea, disrupting global trade.
Most of the dozens of missiles and drones they have launched have been intercepted or fallen short. Israel has carried out a series of retaliatory strikes.
The post Israel Says Missile Launched by Yemen’s Houthis ‘Most Likely’ Intercepted first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Iran Holds Funeral for Commanders and Scientists Killed in War with Israel
People attend the funeral procession of Iranian military commanders, nuclear scientists and others killed in Israeli strikes, in Tehran, Iran, June 28, 2025. Photo: Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via REUTERS
Large crowds of mourners dressed in black lined streets in Iran’s capital Tehran as the country held a funeral on Saturday for top military commanders, nuclear scientists and some of the civilians killed during this month’s aerial war with Israel.
At least 16 scientists and 10 senior commanders were among those mourned at the funeral, according to state media, including armed forces chief Major General Mohammad Bagheri, Revolutionary Guards commander General Hossein Salami, and Guards Aerospace Force chief General Amir Ali Hajizadeh.
Their coffins were driven into Tehran’s Azadi Square adorned with their photos and national flags, as crowds waved flags and some reached out to touch the caskets and throw rose petals onto them. State-run Press TV showed an image of ballistic missiles on display.
Mass prayers were later held in the square.
State TV said the funeral, dubbed the “procession of the Martyrs of Power,” was held for a total of 60 people killed in the war, including four women and four children.
In attendance were President Masoud Pezeshkian and other senior figures including Ali Shamkhani, who was seriously wounded during the conflict and is an adviser to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, as well as Khamenei’s son Mojtaba.
“Today, Iranians, through heroic resistance against two regimes armed with nuclear weapons, protected their honor and dignity, and look to the future prouder, more dignified, and more resolute than ever,” Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi, who also attended the funeral, said in a Telegram post.
There was no immediate statement from Khamenei, who has not appeared publicly since the conflict began. In past funerals, he led prayers over the coffins of senior commanders ahead of public ceremonies broadcast on state television.
Israel launched the air war on June 13, attacking Iranian nuclear facilities and killing top military commanders as well as civilians in the worst blow to the Islamic Republic since the 1980s war with Iraq.
Iran retaliated with barrages of missiles on Israeli military sites, infrastructure and cities. The United States entered the war on June 22 with strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities.
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Israel, the only Middle Eastern country widely believed to have nuclear weapons, said it aimed to prevent Tehran from developing its own nuclear weapons.
Iran denies having a nuclear weapons program. The U.N. nuclear watchdog has said it has “no credible indication” of an active, coordinated weapons program in Iran.
Bagheri, Salami and Hajizadeh were killed on June 13, the first day of the war. Bagheri was being buried at the Behesht Zahra cemetery outside Tehran mid-afternoon on Saturday. Salami and Hajizadeh were due to be buried on Sunday.
US President Donald Trump said on Friday that he would consider bombing Iran again, while Khamenei, who has appeared in two pre-recorded video messages since the start of the war, has said Iran would respond to any future US attack by striking US military bases in the Middle East.
A senior Israeli military official said on Friday that Israel had delivered a “major blow” to Iran’s nuclear project. On Saturday, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said in a statement that Israel and the US “failed to achieve their stated objectives” in the war.
According to Iranian health ministry figures, 610 people were killed on the Iranian side in the war before a ceasefire went into effect on Tuesday. More than 4,700 were injured.
Activist news agency HRANA put the number of killed at 974, including 387 civilians.
Israel’s health ministry said 28 were killed in Israel and 3,238 injured.
The post Iran Holds Funeral for Commanders and Scientists Killed in War with Israel first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Pro-Palestinian Rapper Leads ‘Death to the IDF’ Chant at English Music festival
Revellers dance as Avril Lavigne performs on the Other Stage during the Glastonbury Festival at Worthy Farm, in Pilton, Somerset, Britain, June 30, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Dylan Martinez
i24 News – Chants of “death to the IDF” were heard during the English Glastonbury music festival on Saturday ahead of the appearance of the pro-Palestinian Irish rappers Kneecap.
One half of punk duo based Bob Vylan (who both use aliases to protect their privacy) shouted out during a section of their show “Death to the IDF” – the Israeli military. Videos posted on X (formerly Twitter) show the crowd responding to and repeating the cheer.
This comes after officials had petitioned the music festival to drop the band. The rap duo also expressed support for the following act, Kneecap, who the BCC refused to show live after one of its members, Liam Óg Ó hAnnaidh – better known by stage name Mo Chara – was charged with a terror offense.
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