In the last few days for the first time in many years northern Israel has been on the receiving end of rockets fired out of southern Lebanon, territory under the control of the Shia Hezbollah group long supported by Iranian interests, although apparently some think that it was Palestinians living in this area who fired the rockets. Even if it was, clearly this would not have happened without approval from Iran.
Also in the last few days an oil tanker in the Persian Gulf controlled by the Israelis has been attacked by drones apparently from Iran. Israel has been suddenly on the receiving end of attacks either approved by Iran or actually from Iran. Why now?
The obvious reason is that Iran got a new hardline president, al Raisi, on Tuesday. He is ahowing his hardline credentials, and the word is out that this is showing Iran's unhappiness at the economic sanctions it is under due to the US withdrawal from the JCPOA nuclear agreement, with so far, much to my unhappiness, President Biden has failed to get the US and Iran back into the agrement.
Of course probably the worst enemy of the agreement, who played a major role in convincing then President Trump to withdraw from the agreement, was former Israeli PM, Bibi Netanyahu. He openly wanted Iran to be under economic sanctions to make it harder for it to arm Israel's enemies among its neighbors. But now the ultimate result of that has arrived: Iran attacking Israel. Bibi's campaign has come home to roost.
Barkley Rosser
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There have been further developments in this. According to WaPo Hezbollah itself has now fired rockets into the Shebaa farms area that has long been contested but is controlled by Israel and bragged about doing so, with the Israelis firing back at where they believe the rockets came from.
This has triggered people in Beirut to protest against Hezbollah's actions out of fear that it might trigger Israeli strikes on residential areas, although that has not happened. WaPo says this is Hezbollah asserting its control of southern Lebanon over other groups such as Palestinians and maybe that is it, and maybe it has nothing to do with Ebrahim Raisi becoming president of Iran, although I doubt Hezbollah would do it if Raisi were strongly opposed to them doing it. But given that the Lebanese economy is in a state of total collapse with the political system in a state of paralysis currently, it is not obvious to me why Hezbollah is doing this now.
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