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An Israeli assault on Lebanon, which is now looking imminent, will claw the EU into the conflict in the form of their eastern Mediterranean member Cyprus.
In mid-August, Lebanese Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah warned of a war “without rules or ceilings” in the event of a full-scale Israeli offensive against the Lebanese militia, threatening Cyprus by name. The easternmost EU member has a bilateral defense cooperation agreement with Tel Aviv, and Nasrallah suggested that if any attacks were permitted to be launched from Cypriot airstrips, then the EU too would be drawn into a wider war.
Britain and the US have now deployed close to 1,000 soldiers between them to the island in a bid to aid in the evacuation American and British nationals in Lebanon.
“The military teams have joined the already significant UK diplomatic and military footprint in the region, including RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus and Royal Navy ships RFA Mounts Bay and HMS Duncan, which have remained in the eastern Mediterranean to support British nationals and allies over the summer,” the UK foreign office announced late on Wednesday.
Since the October 7th attack by Hamas, the US has backed Israel diplomatically, providing cover for them at the UN and pushing Israel’s anti-BDS efforts, and militarily, by shipping tens of thousands of tons of bombs and shells to drop on Gaza. Military officials in the Biden Administration have been said as early as June, that the White House doesn’t believe it can hold Netanyahu and his cabinet back “if the situation on the [Lebanese] border continues to escalate”.
However the US has not taken any steps to prevent such an escalation, and in fact has aided in it, both by routinely bombing Yemen and defending Israel from the solitary drone and rocket attack from Iran in the wake of the assassination of Iranian Quds Force Commander Mohammad Reza Zahedi. Additionally, the US has vetoed three UN Security Council resolutions that would have commanded Israel to agree to a ceasefire in Gaza, saying it would impede Washington’s existing efforts to negotiate—efforts that have been rebuffed time and time again by its ally and chief belligerent, Benjamin Netanyahu.
Additionally, the US hasn’t done anything to punish Israel for its obvious act of state-sponsored terrorism when it detonated hundreds of personal communication devices across Lebanon that injured over 3,000 people, almost all of whom were civilians, nor do anything to impede Israel’s 48-hour spree of air strikes that have killed over 500 people in Lebanon since Monday.
Now, the US is joined with France in scrambling to purpose another ceasefire, this one a 21-day proposal in Lebanon, that one of Netanyahu’s closest allies has already rejected.
The naivety is striking. Washington has given Netanyahu every excuse not to negotiate with either Hamas or Hezbollah. Now it must work overtime to prevent a conflict that is now extremely close to triggering a regional war that may expand even beyond Lebanon.
WaL reported in June that Qais al-Khazali, leader of Asa’ib Ahl al-Haq, part of the Iraqi army’s militia groups known as the PMF, said in a televised speech on Monday that if the US were to assist Israel in attacking Hezbollah directly, “then America should know that it will put all its interests in the region, particularly in Iraq, at risk and make them a target”.
Al-Khazali said that they had intelligence the US was preparing to do just that. PMF groups like Asa’ib Ahl al-Haq and Kataib Hezbollah have conducted over 100 separate strikes on US bases, causing around 60 brain injuries like concussions from the blasts. In January, a direct hit on the Tower 22 base in Jordan killed 3 US servicemen. WaL
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PICTURED ABOVE: An RAF Typhoon at RAF Akrotiri Base where 700 additional British troops were recently deployed PC: Crown Copyright © / SAC Helen Rimmer, CC 2.0 / Open Government License.
