Gallant says Israel could cause “massive damage,” while the UN humanitarian chief says war would have “potentially apocalyptic” consequences.
Israel has said it does not want war in Lebanon, but that doing so could send its neighbor “back to the Stone Age.” The UN Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs warned that such a conflict would have “potentially apocalyptic” consequences.
“We do not want war, but we are preparing for every scenario,” Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant told reporters in Washington, DC on Wednesday. “Hezbollah is well aware that we can cause massive damage in the event of a war in Lebanon.”
Israel is capable of “putting Lebanon back in the Stone Age, but we don’t want that,” he said.
Since the current conflict in the Gaza Strip erupted on October 7, there have been daily exchanges of fire between Israeli forces and the Iranian-allied Lebanese Hezbollah along the border between the two countries. Fears of a full-scale war grew this month after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel was preparing for a “very tense operation” on the border with Lebanon.
Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah also threatened a war “without restrictions, without rules and without limits” in the event of a major Israeli offensive against Lebanon.
Gallant’s language is reminiscent of the rhetoric of Benny Gantz, a former general and leader of Israel’s National Unity Party. Gantz recently resigned from the war cabinet, citing a failure to agree on a post-war plan for Gaza.
In a series of campaign videos ahead of the 2019 parliamentary elections, Gantz spoke of sending the Palestinian enclave “back to the Stone Age” during the 2014 Gaza war, a campaign that began under his leadership as army chief.
Meanwhile, UN humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths described Lebanon as “the crisis spot of all crisis spots.”
“This cannot be planned. It is potentially apocalyptic,” he told reporters in Geneva, warning that a war involving Lebanon would drag in Syria and other countries.
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told Gallant on Tuesday that another war with Hezbollah could have “terrible consequences for the Middle East” and urged a diplomatic solution.
A US official said Washington was having “fairly intense discussions” with Israel, Lebanon and other actors and was convinced that neither side was seeking a “major escalation”.
The Lebanese news agency reported on Wednesday that there were about ten Israeli attacks on areas near the border. In one of these, a building in Nabatiyeh was destroyed and five people were injured. Hezbollah claimed responsibility for six attacks on Israeli military positions in the border region.
Gallant also said he had discussed his “afterlife proposals” for managing Gaza after the war with senior U.S. officials. The process, which would involve local Palestinians, regional partners and the U.S., will be “long and complex,” he said.
Gallant, a member of Netanyahu’s Likud party, accused the prime minister in May of failing to present a post-war plan for Gaza – thus repeating US criticism.
While Gallant’s trip to the United States was intended to bolster bipartisan support for Israel amid rising tensions with Lebanon, some observers say it was also an attempt to undermine Netanyahu a month before his planned visit to Washington, DC, where he is scheduled to address a joint session of the U.S. Congress.
