Israel has chosen the wider war

Israeli warplanes are today striking more than a thousand targets in Lebanon. This ratcheting up of the conflict comes after Lebanese Hizbollah had launched hundreds of rockets in recent days against Israeli targets, including near Haifa and settlements in the West Bank.

There is always something the enemy did yesterday to justify what you are doing today. Israel is driving the escalation to pre-empt what it expects would be a major Hizbollah missile attack in response to the cell phone and pager explosions that last week killed and maimed thousands of its militants. Lebanese view the warnings to civilians as an effort to get them to flee.

The prospects are grim

Hizbollah has ample reason to try to duck the escalation. It is losing a lot of rockets to Israeli attacks. The President of Iran, Hizbollah’s sponsor, has indicated a willingness to de-escalate. Many non-Hizbollah Lebanese–while resenting Hizbollah–are not pleased with suffering the brunt of the Israeli attacks.* The air attacks have killed about 500 today alone. Many thousands of civilians are fleeing. But there is no sign that Hizbollah is willing to comply with Israeli demands that it move away from the border to north of the Litani River or stop the rocket attacks.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) have reportedly not yet deployed sufficient ground forces for an invasion. The 2006 Israeli invasion of Lebanon did not go well. Israel will try to avoid a repeat. Its stated objective is to enable Israelis who have had to evacuate from near the northern border to return to their homes. A ground invasion would not serve that objective well, but it is still a possibility.

The regional situation

Israel is now at war with Hamas in Gaza, with the Houthis in Yemen, with Hizbollah in Lebanon, and with Syria, which actively supports Hizbollah. Military experts would not have advised opening a multi-front war.

But this serves Prime Minister Netanyahu’s political interests. So long as the country is at war, he can avoid an election. He is hoping that military success will erase resentment of his many defects and enable him to stay in power. Israelis have not forgotten the October 7 intelligence failure, his corrupt practices, or his extremist coalition partners. But so far postponement has worked, even if it is hard to see how it can work forever.

That said, the Arab countries of the region and Turkey object strongly to what Israel has done in Gaza. They will also protest what they are doing in Lebanon. The sympathies of the Arab and Turkish streets remain with the Palestinians. But the governing elites are happy to see Hamas and Hizbollah get their comeuppance. Both are Islamist movements, albeit one Sunna and the other Shia, that serve Iranian interests and are not welcome in most states in the region.

Implications for the US

The wider war means no negotiated end to the war in Gaza before the US election. This is fine with Netanyahu, who supports Trump’s re-election despite President Biden’s full-throated support for Israel.

Trump hasn’t been outspoken on the Middle East. That is because he would lose Arab American votes in Michigan and Wisconsin if he said he wants Israel to win and win quickly and big. But that is precisely what his Netanyahu-aligned advisors and supporters want. He would avoid the handwringing about civilian casualties Biden has evinced or the appreciation for Palestinian rights that Vice President Kamala Harris has voiced.

American restraint on Israel isn’t happening before the November 5 election. Netanyahu knows that. Expect him to use the next six weeks to continue to do as much damage as he can to Hamas and Hizbollah, no matter the harm to Arab civilians.

*Apologies: this sentence did not say what I meant in the original posting.