On Thursday alone, 59 people were killed, the ministry said.
Archiv: coups / attempts / regime changes / invasions (aggressions / interventions)
Israel launches air strikes on Dahieh in southern Beirut
The Israeli Air Force on Friday said it carried out „intelligence-based“ air strikes on what it describes as Hezbollah „infrastructure“ in Dahieh, in southern Beirut.
U.N. to bolster UNIFIL for post-truce support in Lebanon, peacekeeping chief says
The United Nations intends to bolster its peacekeeping mission in Lebanon to better support the Lebanese army once a truce is agreed but would not directly enforce a ceasefire, U.N. peacekeeping chief Jean-Pierre Lacroix said on Thursday.
Israeli attacks kill 21 more people in Lebanon as death toll nears 3,400
At least 21 people were killed in Israeli attacks across Lebanon on Wednesday, bringing the overall death toll since last year to 3,386, the Lebanese Health Ministry said on Thursday.
Israeli airstrikes hit Beirut’s southern suburbs as death toll rises in Lebanon
Baalbek-Al-Hermel Governor Bashir Al-Khodr confirmed that rescuers pulled 12 bodies from the rubble, all for paramedics, after an Israeli airstrike hit a civil defense center in Baalbek, where over 20 people were sheltering.
The Lebanese Health Ministry reported that an airstrike on the Shaab neighborhood in Baalbek killed eight people, including five women, and left 27 others wounded.
The ministry added that four other people were killed in attacks on several locations in eastern Lebanon.
Israeli strike on Lebanon‘s Baalbek kills 15 rescuers
The death toll from Israel‘s strike on Baalbek, eastern Lebanon has risen to 15 civil defence members, Baalbek governor Bachir Khodr said on X.
Khodr adds that 10 bodies were identified, while the remaining five were recovered in pieces, requiring DNA testing.
„Mercy to the heroic martyrs and patience to their families,“ he said.
At least 16 people killed by Israel strikes across Lebanon
At least 16 people were killed and 18 wounded on Wednesday by Israeli strikes on Lebanon, the country‘s health ministry said.
The total casualty toll since 8 October 2023 now stands at 3,386 killed and 14,417 injured.
The ministry said 220 children were among the casualties.
Nearly 100,000 homes damaged in year of Hezbollah-Israel fighting in Lebanon: World Bank
More than a year of clashes that escalated into war in September have cost Lebanon more than $5 billion in economic losses and damaged nearly 100,000 housing units, the World Bank said Thursday.
The World Bank report provided estimates for damage between October 8, 2023, and October 27, 2024, saying „the conflict has caused $5.1 billion in economic losses“ and that it „damaged an estimated 99,209 housing units“ — mainly in Lebanon‘s war-torn south.
Trump Picks Pete Hegseth, a Veteran and Fox News Host, for Defense Secretary
The choice of Mr. Hegseth was outside the norm of the traditional defense secretary. But he was a dedicated supporter of Mr. Trump during his first term, defending his interactions with the North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, embracing his “America First” agenda of trying to withdraw U.S. troops from abroad and energetically taking up the cause of combat veterans accused of war crimes.
(…)
He served in the Army in Afghanistan and Iraq and at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.
A Minnesota native, Mr. Hegseth graduated from Princeton University, where he was the publisher of The Princeton Tory, a conservative magazine, for which he wrote about seeing the statue of Saddam Hussein toppled in Baghdad in 2003.
Russia asks Israel to avoid air strikes near Syrian base
Russia has asked Israel to avoid launching aerial strikes near one of Moscow‘s bases in Syria, a top official said on Wednesday.
US carried out strikes against Iranian linked targets in Syria
(November 11, 2024)
The U.S. military said on Monday it had carried out strikes against nine targets associated with Iranian groups in Syria.
(…)
The U.S. has 900 troops in Syria, and 2,500 more in neighboring Iraq, on a mission to advise and assist local forces trying to prevent a resurgence of Islamic State, which in 2014 seized large swathes of both countries but was later defeated.
Death toll in Lebanon rises to 3,287
The ministry said 44 people were killed and 88 wounded on Monday.
Israeli army chief approves expansion of Lebanon ground invasion: Report
Israel‘s army Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi has approved the expansion of the ground invasion of southern Lebanon, according to Israel‘ Kan broadcaster.
The approval comes the same day Israeli defence minister Israel Katz said Israel had „defeated“ Hezbollah
1.25 Million Have ‚Top Secret‘ Access in the U.S.
(April 14, 2023)
Peo0le with clearance and access to „Top Secret“ U.S.federal government information, by employee type
Government 605.579
Contractor 472.576
Other 173.803
Total 1.251.958
As of Oct.1, 2019
Source: Office of the Director of National Intelligence via Federation of American Scientists
TOP SECRET AMERICA: National Security Inc.
(July 20, 2010)
The Post investigation uncovered what amounts to an alternative geography of the United States, a Top Secret America created since 9/11 that is hidden from public view, lacking in thorough oversight and so unwieldy that its effectiveness is impossible to determine.
It is also a system in which contractors are playing an ever more important role. The Post estimates that out of 854,000 people with top-secret clearances, 265,000 are contractors. There is no better example of the government‘s dependency on them than at the CIA, the one place in government that exists to do things overseas that no other U.S. agency is allowed to do.
(…)
Contractors kill enemy fighters. They spy on foreign governments and eavesdrop on terrorist networks. They help craft war plans. They gather information on local factions in war zones. They are the historians, the architects, the recruiters in the nation‘s most secretive agencies. They staff watch centers across the Washington area. They are among the most trusted advisers to the four-star generals leading the nation‘s wars.
When Did Liberals Become So Comfortable With War?
First, history has shown that governments and bureaucracies tend to become addicted to a war footing, with failure sucking them in further — think of America’s war on terror, or Vietnam. War encourages a perverse cycle of escalation in which huge financial and political gains accrue for governments and the military-industrial complex while the costs tend to be borne by weaker parties — before they start to come home in some shape or form.
We’ve called this bipartisan pattern “wreckonomics” and have found it especially present in wars or conflicts with costs that Western politicians can largely outsource — from fighting terrorism, drugs and smugglers to quasi-colonial interventions during the Cold War.
Israeli strikes in Lebanon kill 19 more, taking death toll to 3,136
(November 9, 2024)
The attacks have forced more than 1 million people to flee their homes, and they are in need of humanitarian aid.
UNESCO Calls Emergency Session for Lebanese Heritage Sites Imperiled by Israeli Bombing
UNESCO’s Special Committee for the Protection of Cultural Property will hold an emergency session on November 18 dedicated to heritage sites in Lebanon as Israel intensifies its bombing of Baalbek, a historic city in eastern Lebanon home to one of the world’s best-preserved Roman ruins.
UN peacekeepers say Israel‘s destruction of their property breaches international law
In its latest accusation, UNIFIL said the IDF used excavators and a bulldozer to destroy part of a fence and concrete structure at a U.N. peacekeeping position in southern Lebanon on Thursday. Peacekeepers had also observed Israeli troops this week removing a barrel that marks blue line, it said.
„The IDF‘s deliberate and direct destruction of clearly identifiable UNIFIL property is a flagrant violation of international law and resolution 1701,“ UNIFIL said, referring to a U.N. resolution that mandates a cessation of hostilities in southern Lebanon after a previous war.
At least 40 killed in Israeli strikes on eastern Lebanon
At least 3,050 people have been killed and 13,658 wounded in Israeli attacks since the war on Gaza began, according to Health Ministry figures.
Erasing ‚Any Sign of Life,‘ Israeli Demolition Teams Razing Entire Villages in Lebanon
Satellite photos examined by The Washington Post, Reuters, and the Financial Times showed vast destruction caused by Israeli bombing and controlled demolitions of towns and villages, many of whose residents are among the more than 1.2 million people forcibly displaced by the war. (…)
„We‘re a family of artists, my father is well-known, and our home was a known cultural home,“ Lebanon Philharmonic Orchestra conductor Lubnan Baalbaki told Reuters after viewing satellite images confirming the destruction of his family home.
„If you have such high-level intelligence that you can target specific military figures, then you know what‘s in that house,“ Baalbaki added. „It was an art house. We are all artists. The aim is to erase any sign of life.“
Strikes in Gaza, Lebanon, as aid teams support ‘overwhelmed’ burns centre
Victims from airstrikes in Lebanon “overwhelmed the hospital”, the WHO official explained, insisting that it was critical to continue supporting “the only burns centre that’s available in the country. Off the 40 burns patients treated so far “25 per cent of them are children”, he said.
Initially equipped with 10 beds, the Geitaoui Hospital burns centre has had to expand to 25 beds, providing critical care to severely injured patients.
There are enough new trauma kits to treat 50 patients twice; each kit has two modules, one containing medications and other supplies, the other specialist burns treatments and dressings.
Expressing solidarity with Lebanon’s health professionals, the top UN aid coordinator in the country condemned ongoing military targeting of medical personnel and infrastructure, including ambulances which are “very much under attack”.
“We need to be supporting them with supplies, we need to be supporting them also need with advocacy,” said Imran Riza, UN Humanitarian Coordinator for Lebanon. “There have been great violations of international humanitarian law that we are seeing. So, we need to make sure these are not happening, that health care workers can do what they‘re there for, helping people and saving lives.”
Hospital remains open in evacuated Lebanese city amid Israeli attacks | BBC News
Lebanon’s Health Ministry says Israel’s attacks on Lebanon have killed more than 3,000 people since October last year.
As Israel continues its intense bombardment, one of Lebanon’s main cities in the south, Nabatieh, is now largely empty.
Israel ordered the entire city to evacuate in early October.
Despite this, the city’s main hospital remains open, and emergency services are still operating for the approximately 200 families who remain there.
Israel destroys 37 towns, over 40,000 houses in deadly onslaught on Lebanon
The Israeli army has erased 37 towns and destroyed more than 40,000 housing units since the start of its deadly offensive on Lebanon last year, local media said on Tuesday.
The state news agency NNA said the destruction is concentrated in an area extending three kilometers deep from Naqoura to the outskirts of Khiam in southern Lebanon.
Israel’s path of destruction in southern Lebanon raises fears of an attempt to create a buffer zone
(November 1, 2024)
Israeli warplanes and ground forces have blasted a trail of destruction through southern Lebanon the past month. The aim, Israel says, is to debilitate the Hezbollah militant group, push it away from the border and end more than a year of Hezbollah fire into northern Israel.
Even United Nations peacekeepers and Lebanese troops in the south have come under fire from Israeli forces, raising questions over whether they can remain in place.
472,000 Refugees Flee Lebanon to Syria Due to Rising Israel-Hezbollah Tensions
Roughly 472,000 people have fled from Lebanon to Syria since September due to the escalating hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah, according to a report published by the UN’s refugee agency.
(…)
Lebanon hosted roughly 1.5 million Syrian refugees as of Sept. 25, the UNHCR said, which, compared to Lebanon’s relatively small population of only 5.3 million, posed a massive humanitarian challenge for the country’s already struggling economy.
Lebanon Death Toll Passes 3,000 in Israel-Hezbollah War: Lebanese Officials
The death toll in Lebanon has grown to over 3,000, the country‘s health ministry said this week amid ongoing fighting between Israel and Hezbollah.
On Monday, Lebanon‘s Health Ministry reported its new death toll from 13 months of conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, noting that at least 13,492 others have been wounded.
Lebanon: UN condemns increasing loss of life and civilian suffering
Since October of last year, the World Health Organization (WHO) said that 110 healthcare workers have been killed in the line of duty in Lebanon. There have been at least 60 attacks on healthcare facilities over the past 13 months.
Death toll from Israeli attacks on Lebanon reaches 2,897
In the past 24 hours alone, 30 people were killed and 183 injured.
Mindestens 52 Todesopfer nach israelischen Angriffen auf Osten Libanons
Bei israelischen Angriffen auf den Osten des Libanons sind nach offiziellen Angaben mindestens 52 Menschen getötet worden. Das libanesische Gesundheitsministerium teilte am späten Abend mit, weitere mindestens 72 Personen seien verletzt worden. Zunächst war von zehn Toten die Rede gewesen. Aus libanesischen Sicherheitskreisen hatte es geheißen, es habe rund 16 israelische Luftangriffe auf mehrere Orte im Gouvernement Baalbek-Hermel im Nordosten gegeben. Laut der Mitteilung des Ministeriums gab es in 14 Ortschaften von Baalbek-Hermel Verletzte und Tote.
Knesset Advances Legislation to Disqualify Hadash and Arab Lawmakers
Among the acts that would be construed as support for terror would be visiting the family of an attack suspect.
According to the proposal sponsored by Likud MK Ofir Katz, a candidate can be banned by the Central Election Committee without needing the final approval of the High Court of Justice, as is currently required. The proposed law is at base to ban Hadash and Arab parties from participating in the election, as well as weaken the Supreme Court’s power to overturn the decision. Furthermore, since left-wing and Arab voters do not belong to the right-wing camp, blocking participation of Hadash and Arab parties will also benefit the current far-right governing coalition electorally and increase its chances to win the next election.
Israel strikes Beirut area; U.N. warns conditions in northern Gaza ‘apocalyptic’
The Israeli military on Friday carried out overnight strikes on the southern suburbs of Lebanon’s capital for the first time in days, while U.N. leaders warned that the conditions in northern Gaza are “apocalyptic.”
Lebanese death toll from Israeli attacks climbs to 2,865
The dead included 178 medical staff and first-aid personnel, said the report.
The Lebanese government has set up 1,130 refugee centers to accommodate the displaced, of which 948 are at capacity. Currently, there are 189,174 displaced people staying in official refugee centers.
Israel has damaged or destroyed nearly a quarter of buildings in Lebanon’s south
Nearly a quarter of all buildings in 25 Lebanese municipalities near the Israeli border had been damaged or destroyed as of Saturday, according to an analysis of satellite data by The Washington Post — illustrating the far-reaching toll of Israel’s land and air war against Hezbollah.
Across the borderlands, at least 5,868 buildings have been damaged or destroyed, including nearly half of structures in the two hardest-hit areas, Ayta al-Shab and Kfar Kila. The vast majority of the damage — almost 80 percent — has occurred since Oct. 2, the day after Israel launched its ground invasion.
Lebanon death toll surpasses 2,700
(29.10.2024)
Over the last day alone, 82 people were killed, and 180 others injured, the ministry said.
“Save Us from Ourselves”: 3,000+ Israelis Call for Int’l Help to Pressure Israel to Back Ceasefire
Neve Gordon, welcome back to Democracy Now! Can you start off actually by talking about what this letter says? And the number of people is — the last time we looked, it was 2,000 Israelis who have signed it. Now it’s over 3,000, Professor Gordon.
NEVE GORDON: There’s a feeling among Israelis that the change cannot come from within. We do not have enough power from within to change the course of actions that Netanyahu and his government have put in place. And the only way to stop the violence, to stop the genocidal violence in Gaza, to stop the violence in Lebanon, and to stop future attacks and geopolitical war in the region is that leaders in Europe and leaders in North America, particularly the United States, put their leg down and say enough is enough and threaten Israel that if there is no ceasefire, they will sanction Israel, they will stop arms trade with Israel, they’ll stop sending Israel money, and ultimately stop trading with Israel. So, our belief is, to save the populations that inhabit this region, we need such an action.
«Citoyens israéliens, nous appelons à une pression internationale pour qu’Israël cesse le massacre»
Nous, citoyennes et citoyens israéliens, résidant en Israël et ailleurs, appelons la communauté internationale – l’Organisation des Nations unies et ses institutions, les Etats-Unis, l’Union européenne, la Ligue arabe, ainsi que tous les pays du monde – à intervenir immédiatement en appliquant contre Israël toute sanction possible afin d’obtenir un cessez-le-feu immédiat entre Israël et ses voisins. Et cela, pour l’avenir des peuples vivant en Israël Palestine et dans la région, et afin de garantir leur droit à la sécurité et à la vie. Mercredi, le chef du Hamas, Yahya Sinwar, a été tué par l’armée israélienne. Or, on craint que cette mort, qui a été annoncée comme la fin de l’offensive israélienne, ne soit qu’une étape de ce chemin meurtrier vers l’abîme.
Israelis are begging the world to save them from themselves!
The lack of true international pressure, the continuation of arms supplies to Israel, economic and security partnerships and scientific and cultural collaborations, bring most Israelis to believe that Israel’s policies enjoy international support. The leaders of many countries make repeated statements about the horror they feel and verbally denounce Israel’s operations, but these condemnations are not backed by practical actions. We are replete with empty words and declarations.
Please, for our futures and the futures of all of the residents of Israel and the region, save us from ourselves and use real pressure on Israel for an immediate ceasefire.
2,672 killed, 12,468 injured in Israeli airstrikes on Lebanon: health ministry
The death toll from Israeli airstrikes in Lebanon since Oct 8, 2023, reached 2,672, while injuries increased to 12,468, said the Lebanese Health Ministry on Sunday.
The report added that the total number of deaths from Israeli airstrikes on Saturday was 19, with injuries reported at 108.