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Firefighters work where rockets fired by Hezbollah reportedly struck several locations in Nahariya, Israel’s northern Galilee region, on March 16, 2026. [Samir Abdalhade – Anadolu Agency]
Israeli media reported Thursday that Hezbollah launched about 600 rockets, drones and mortar rounds over the past 24 hours, most of them targeting Israeli forces in southern Lebanon, Anadolu reports.
According to Channel 24, the projectiles were fired toward Israeli territory and troops operating in southern Lebanon.
“More than half of the launches were directed at Israeli forces,” the channel said.
Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said Wednesday that Hezbollah has launched more than 3,500 rockets, shells and drones toward Israel since the current conflict began early this month.
Earlier Thursday, the Israeli military said a soldier was killed in combat in southern Lebanon, where hostilities have escalated since March 2.
According to military figures, three Israeli soldiers have so far been killed in southern Lebanon.
In a separate statement, the Israeli military said Golani Brigade forces continued “focused ground operations” to expand what it described as a “forward security zone” in southern Lebanon.
Israel has pounded Lebanon with airstrikes and launched a ground offensive in southern Lebanon since a cross-border attack by the Hezbollah group on March 2.
Lebanese authorities say at least 1,094 people have been killed and 3,119 injured in Israeli attacks since then.
The current escalation came amid a joint US-Israeli offensive on Iran which has killed more than 1,340 people since Feb. 28. Iran has retaliated with drone and missile strikes targeting Israel, US bases and Gulf countries.
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Keir Starmer explains that UK is participating defensively in Trump and Israel’s criminal war for Israel’s genocidal expansion in Iran and states that he supports Zionism “without qualification”. Keir Starmer said “I said it loud and clear – and meant it – that I support Zionism without qualification.” here: https://www.jewishnews.co.uk/keir-starmer-interview-i-will-work-to-eradicate-antisemitism-from-day-one/Donald Trump warns against following the https://onaquietday.org blog, says that it’s easy atm, she only needs to report war crimes supporting Israel’s genocidal expansion.Orcas discuss how Trump was re-elected and him being an obviously insane, xenophobic Fascist.
Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu points to his map of ‘the New Middle East’ during his address to the United Nations General Assembly, Sept. 22, 2023. | Richard Drew / AP
As the U.S.- Israeli wars across West Asia widen, a clearer picture is emerging of Israel’s long-term strategic and ideological objectives, and they go far beyond claims of “security” or “self-defense.”
This week, Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich made that reality explicit. Speaking publicly amid Israel’s escalating assault on Lebanon, he declared that Israel’s northern border “must be the Litani River,” calling for the outright conquest and annexation of southern Lebanon.
This is not fringe rhetoric. It is a statement from a senior cabinet minister, and one that aligns with military actions already underway on the ground.
Israeli forces are not merely striking Hezbollah positions. They are systematically reshaping southern Lebanon: Vital [b]ridges over the Litani River have been destroyed, cutting off civilian movement and isolating the south from the rest of Lebanon. Entire villages are being leveled and depopulated, as the Israeli government calls for the demolition of homes and other civilian infrastructure. This has led to over a million Lebanese already being displaced.
Rather than taking temporary battlefield measures, the Israeli army is putting in place the material preconditions for territorial reorganization.
Military planners and political leaders are increasingly aligned around the idea of a permanent “buffer zone” south of the Litani. Such language has historically often preceded de facto annexation, and Smotrich’s statement removes any ambiguity. The goal is a permanently expanded Israel.
What is now unfolding in Lebanon follows the pattern already visible in Gaza. Israeli officials and lawmakers have repeatedly called for the resettlement of Gaza by Israeli settlers and the absorption of large portions of its territory into Israel. Many in Israeli leadership have even called for the depopulation of Gaza to build a Jewish majority in the territory. The destruction of entire cities like Rafah and Beit Hanoun has already emptied former population centers of their residents.
In Lebanon, Israeli leaders are explicitly invoking this precedent. Government figures have urged applying the “Gaza model” to southern Lebanon, meaning the destruction of villages, displacing populations, and then redefining control on the ground.
Gaza and Lebanon are thus not two separate wars; they are two avenues in pursuit of the same strategy. While bombs fall in Gaza and Lebanon, the West Bank is undergoing its own transformation. Israeli settler violence, mass expulsions, and military raids have intensified alongside open political calls to formally annex that territory, as well. Entire Palestinian communities are being pushed off their land, often under direct protection of the Israeli military.
There is no large-scale bombardment as in Gaza and Lebanon, but the goal of removing the population and normalizing such actions remains the same.
At the same time, Israel has expanded its military operations deeper into Syria, targeting Iranian-linked infrastructure and asserting “freedom of action” across the country. Just this week, Israeli forces entered the Syrian city of Qunetra, set up road blocks, and arrested residents, as if Israel already had legal jurisdiction over this Syrian city.
These strikes are being framed as preemptive defense, but taken together with operations in Gaza and Lebanon, they reflect a broader doctrine. Israel is showing it intends to reshape the entire region through force, regardless of sovereignty.
The messianic vision of a Greater Israel
What ties these fronts together is not simply conflict with Hamas, Hezbollah, or Iran. It is a coherent territorial and political project known as The Greater Israel Project. Proponents of this idea have long called for Israel to expand its borders south into Egypt and northward and westward to the Euphrates River. Their claim is based on Biblical passages that say God promised these lands to Abraham’s descendants.
While this idea was once rightfully scene as fringe, religious fanaticism, it has become increasingly mainstream. U.S. Ambassador to Israel and famed Chritisan Zionist Mike Huckabee recently endorsed such a vision during an interview with Tucker Carlson. Even the supposed secular and “liberal” leader of the Israeli opposition, Yair Lapid, said he supported the idea of expanding Israel to match the biblical description.
What’s happening on the ground shows that such talk is not simply empty rhetoric for religious constituents but a plan being put into action. Smotrich’s statement is significant not because it is shocking, but because it is consistent. It articulates openly what Israeli policy has been implementing incrementally: the use of war to redraw borders and reshape demographics across the region.
These wars by Israel are materially enabled and politically shielded by the United States. The current escalation—particularly the joint U.S.-Israeli war against Iran—has created the conditions under which these expansionist, fanatical aims can be pursued under the cover of a broader regional conflict.
The Trump administration continues to frame these actions as part of a defensive alliance, but the outcome on the ground expanding war, mass displacement, and the steady erosion of national sovereignty across multiple countries.
The danger of the current moment lies in its normalization. Greater Israel was once an idea the fascist right wing carefully whispered about only among like-minded people. Today, it has become official policy of the Israeli government, with the backing of the United States.
The question is no longer whether such plans exist. It is whether they will be allowed to proceed unchallenged. If the Litani River becomes Israel’s new northern border, it will not be the end of the process. From there, history suggests, the map will not stop changing.
As with all op-eds and news analytical articles published by People’s World, the views expressed here are those of the author.
J.E. Rosenberg grew up in an extremist, religious Zionist household in the U.S. After moving to Israel as a young adult, he changed his world views. He left Israel and is now a member of the Communist Party.
Keir Starmer explains that UK is participating defensively in Trump and Israel’s criminal war for Israel’s genocidal expansion in Iran and states that he supports Zionism “without qualification”. Keir Starmer said “I said it loud and clear – and meant it – that I support Zionism without qualification.” here: https://www.jewishnews.co.uk/keir-starmer-interview-i-will-work-to-eradicate-antisemitism-from-day-one/Donald Trump warns against following the https://onaquietday.org blog, says that it’s easy atm, she only needs to report war crimes supporting Israel’s genocidal expansion.Orcas discuss Genocide-supporting and complicit Zionists. Donald Trump, Keith Starmer, David Lammy, Rachel Reeves, Angela Rayner are called evil genocide-complicit and supporting cnuts.
Two members of the Iranian Red Crescent Society stand among others on the ruins of buildings in a residential area in Tehran, Iran, on March 15, 2026. (Photo by Morteza Nikoubazl/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
“The end of the war will occur when Iran decides it should end, not when Trump envisions its conclusion,” said an Iranian official.
Iranian state media reported Wednesday that Iran has rejected the Trump administration’s 15-point ceasefire plan, and a senior official outlined five conditions for ending the war, which the US and Israel launched late last month.
As President Donald Trumpsent thousands more troops to the Middle East, the ceasefire plan “was submitted to Iran by intermediaries from Pakistan, who have offered to host renewed negotiations between Washington and Tehran,” The Associated Press reported early Wednesday, citing an unnamed source briefed on the US proposal.
As experts warn that a global recession could occur if Iran continues to restrict the flow of fossil fuels through the Strait of Hormuz, Reuters highlighted that elevated “oil prices sank about 5% on Wednesday after reports the United States had sent Iran a 15-point proposal aimed at ending the war.”
However, “Iran has responded negatively to an American proposal aimed at ending the ongoing imposed war,” according to the Iranian state-run Press TV, which spoke with a senior political-security official.
Characterizing previous negotiations with the US—including nuclear talks in the lead-up to the current war—as deceptive, the official said that “Iran will end the war when it decides to do so and when its own conditions are met.”
In addition to the Iranian government’s demands from the recent negotiations in Geneva, the official said, the five conditions under which Iran would now agree to end the war are:
A complete halt to “aggression and assassinations” by the enemy;
The establishment of concrete mechanisms to ensure that the war is not reimposed;
Guaranteed and clearly defined payment of war damages and reparations;
The conclusion of the war across all fronts and for all resistance groups involved throughout the region; and
Iran’s exercise of sovereignty over the Strait of Hormuz is and will remain Iran’s natural and legal right, and it constitutes a guarantee for the implementation of the other party’s commitments, and must be recognized.
A ceasefire is contingent upon acceptance of those conditions, and “no negotiations will be held prior to that,” the official told Press TV. “The end of the war will occur when Iran decides it should end, not when Trump envisions its conclusion.”
The Iranian government this week put the death toll from the US-Israeli assault at over 1,500. According to Reuters, the news agency of the US-based Human Rights Activists in Iran said at least 3,291 people, including 1,455 civilians, are dead. US and Israeli bombings have also damaged tens of thousands of civilian locations, including homes, schools, medical facilities, energy installations, courthouses, and United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization World Heritage sites.
There have also been civilian and military casualties across the region, including more than 1,000 people slaughtered in Israel’s bombing of Lebanon, 16 killed in Israel, and 13 confirmed deaths of US service members, according to the AP.
Speaking at UN headquarters in New York on Wednesday, Secretary-General António Guterres renewed his call for the US and Israel to end their war on Iran, which he said is “out of control” and “has broken past the limits even leaders thought unimaginable.”
“The world is staring down the barrel of a wider war, a rising tide of human suffering, and a deeper global economic shock. This has gone too far,” Guterres said. “It is time to stop climbing the escalation ladder—and start climbing the diplomatic ladder, and return to full respect of international law.”
“I have remained in close contact with many from the region and around the world. A number of initiatives for dialogue and peace are underway. They must succeed,” he continued. “My message to the United States and Israel is that it is high time to end the war—as human suffering deepens, civilian casualties mount, and the global economic impact is increasingly devastating. My message to Iran is to stop attacking their neighbors that are not parties to the conflict.”
The UN chief then turned to Lebanon, which he recently visited: “There, too, the war must stop. Hezbollah must stop launching attacks into Israel. And Israel must stop its military operations and strikes in Lebanon, which are hitting civilians the hardest. The Gaza model must not be replicated in Lebanon.”
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Responding to the expansion of Israeli military ground operations in southern Lebanon, Human Rights Watch has warned that countries that continue to provide Israel with arms and military aid risk complicity in the Israeli government’s serious violations in Lebanon. [1]
Ellie Chowns, Green Party MP for North Herefordshire. CC image Wikipedia.
Reacting to the warnings of UK complicity in Israel’s violations in Lebanon, Dr Ellie Chowns MP said:
“Israel has continuously flouted international law with apparent impunity. That impunity must end. Throughout Israel’s genocide in Gaza and illegal settlement expansion in the West Bank, the UK Government has refused to pursue appropriate action against its government for breaching international law or to re-evaluate Israel’s status as an ally to Britain.
“This permissiveness has not tempered but emboldened the Israeli government. Following its strikes on Iran, Israel has expanded its ground campaign in Lebanon, displacing a million people throughout the country, killing over 1,000 people – including 118 children – destroying civilian infrastructure, and seemingly preparing for prolonged occupation of southern Lebanon.
“Israeli government and military officials have made repeated overt comparisons between its plans for Lebanon and its genocidal destruction of Gaza. Human Rights Watch has now warned that Israeli officials have signalled an intent to wantonly destroy homes in Lebanon’s border villages, forcibly displace and prevent the return of “hundreds of thousands of Shiite residents of southern Lebanon”, and conduct strikes in Beirut that could target civilians simply for being “near Hezbollah members, facilities, or means of combat.” All these actions would constitute war crimes.
“The Government must heed these serious warnings and act decisively to avoid the UK’s complicity in further crimes and to end the impunity which has enabled and emboldened Israel. The Green Party reiterates our calls for the UK to halt all arms sales to and military cooperation with the Israeli Government, to drive independent investigations into war crimes committed and support justice mechanisms for victims, and to impose sanctions on government officials responsible for breaches of international law.”
Human Rights Watch highlight recent statements from Israeli officials that signal “an intent to forcibly displace residents, destroy civilian homes and conduct strikes that could target civilians. Forcible displacement, wanton destruction and attacks deliberately targeting civilians are war crimes.”
Since the recent escalation of hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah on March 2, Israeli attacks have killed at least 1,029 people in Lebanon, including 118 children and 40 medical workers, as of March 22 according to Lebanon’s Ministry of Public Health, and over one million people have been displaced following a series of displacement orders by the Israeli military.
Human Rights Watch recommends that “Israel’s key allies, including the United States, the United Kingdom, and Germany, should suspend military assistance and arms sales to Israel and impose targeted sanctions on officials credibly responsible for ongoing serious abuses. They should levy further pressure on Israel to ensure that displaced residents can return to their homes once hostilities end or once the reasons for their displacement cease to exist.”
Lebanon researcher at Human Rights Watch, Ramzi Kaiss, said, “Atrocities flourish when there is impunity, and other countries should no longer stand by as they continue.”
Keir Starmer explains that UK is participating defensively in Trump and Israel’s criminal war for Israel’s genocidal expansion in Iran and states that he supports Zionism “without qualification”. Keir Starmer said “I said it loud and clear – and meant it – that I support Zionism without qualification.” here: https://www.jewishnews.co.uk/keir-starmer-interview-i-will-work-to-eradicate-antisemitism-from-day-one/Donald Trump calls for help from NATO allies in securing the Straight of Hormuz despite saying only 9 days ago that they don’t need people to join wars after they’ve already won.Orcas discuss Genocide-supporting and complicit Zionists. Donald Trump, Keith Starmer, David Lammy, Rachel Reeves, Angela Rayner and Wes Streeting are acknowledged as evil genocide-complicit and supporting cnuts.
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Protesters gathered outside the White House to demonstrate against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s visit to Washington, DC, on February 11, 2026. [Celal Güneş – Anadolu Agency]
On the eve of a planned visit, Human Rights Watch on Friday has called on Hungarian authorities to arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu if he enters the country, Anadolu reports.
The visit, set to start Saturday, comes weeks before Hungary’s April 12 general elections.
“Despite its move to leave the ICC (International Criminal Court), Hungary is still a member country and is still obligated to arrest and surrender individuals wanted by the court,” said Alice Autin, international justice researcher at Human Rights Watch.
“By flouting this obligation, for the second time in less than a year, Hungary would further entrench impunity for serious crimes in Palestine and once again betray victims who have been denied justice for far too long,” she added.
The call comes after the ICC issued an arrest warrant for Netanyahu and then-Defense Minister Yoav Gallant in 2024 over alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes in Gaza since October 2023.
Both remain fugitives from the ICC.
Netanyahu previously visited Hungary in April 2025 without being arrested. Hungary has formally announced its intention to withdraw from the ICC treaty, effective this June 2, sparking criticism from international lawyers and civil society.
Human Rights Watch also decried ongoing Israeli military operations in Lebanon, Gaza, and against Iran, stressing the “urgent need to respect the rule of law and support credible avenues for justice.”
The organization also called on EU and ICC member states to press Hungary to reverse its withdrawal and cooperate with the court.
“(Prime Minister Viktor) Orban’s government is about to roll out the red carpet again for Netanyahu, when it is obligated to arrest him,” Autin said. “Silence and persistent inaction from the EU risks sending a dangerous message of acquiescence as the Israeli government continues to be responsible for atrocities.”
Israel in October 2024 launched a two-year war on the Gaza Strip, killing more than 71,000 people, injuring over 172,000, and destroying about 90% of the enclave’s civilian infrastructure, with reconstruction costs estimated by the UN at around $70 billion.
Despite an October 2025 truce, Israel has continued its daily attacks, killing at least 677 Palestinians and injuring 1,813 others since the ceasefire, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.
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