“Former Obama senior adviser David Axelrod argued that Vice President Kamala Harris voters will be clever enough to navigate voting in the wake of the devastation from Hurricane Helene, while saying that rural Trump voters will have a harder time getting to the polls.” [Fox News 10-5-24]
He’s openly admitting it. He’s BRAGGING, in fact. How sick and evil do these people have to be until more of us act and feel appropriately? These aren’t political shenanigans. It’s genocide in rural America. It’s open cleansing of the population so that the whole country will become leftists. Yes, they’re that evil — and they’re even telling you so.
The one thing we have not yet seen in the developing American civil war: What it looks like when justifiably angry people begin to express their rage. Perhaps North Carolina will be the trigger.
Senator Rand Paul says: “Mao and Stalin and Hitler didn’t come to power promoting tyranny. They came to power promising equality.”
And probably “joy” too.
Obama is our Mao and Stalin. Harris and Biden are two of his puppets. For a preview of what’s coming, look at how they’re murdering people in North Carolina, Georgia and Tennessee. In one form or another, they are coming for all of us, except those of us willing to submit and comply 100 percent.
Follow Dr. Hurd on Facebook. Search under “Michael Hurd” (Charleston SC). Get up-to-the-minute postings, recommended articles and links, and engage in back-and-forth discussion with Dr. Hurd on topics of interest. Also follow Dr. Hurd on X at @MichaelJHurd1, drmichaelhurd on Instagram, @DrHurd on TruthSocial. Dr. Hurd is also now a Newsmax Insider!
Once upon a time, politicians (especially Democrats) worked to create the image they CARED about flood victims, and the like. It was disgusting, but a thin veneer of accountability compelled them to fake it. Today, Obama’s henchpersons, Biden and Kamala, simply laugh or brush it off — or simply lie.
Under Mao and Stalin, millions were sacrificed for the sake of the political careers of the rulers. On the exact same premise, tens of thousands of Trump voters in rural North Carolina, Georgia and Tennessee are being sacrificed. It’s not just that they’re being denied FEMA and federal support that would be heaped on New York or California. They’re being denied the right to privately attain aid from volunteers who could fly in supplies and aid. Local authorities are stopped, as well.
Under Communism, the government holds a monopoly on assistance; it performs incompetently, and doles out the aid based on political factors. Under America’s Obama-Biden-Kamala regime, it’s exactly the same.
That’s why I have been writing for 4 years that these leftist totalitarians in power are capable of ANYTHING. Believe me yet?
Follow Dr. Hurd on Facebook. Search under “Michael Hurd” (Charleston SC). Get up-to-the-minute postings, recommended articles and links, and engage in back-and-forth discussion with Dr. Hurd on topics of interest. Also follow Dr. Hurd on X at @MichaelJHurd1, drmichaelhurd on Instagram, @DrHurd on TruthSocial. Dr. Hurd is also now a Newsmax Insider!
I heard on Sean Hannity yesterday evening that Biden is creating chaos in the storm-ravaged hills of North Carolina because he wants to have a p.r. appearance to benefit the Commiefascist whore who ousted him. (Why does he care about her?)
If it were up to me, the military would dump Joe, Dr. Biden and Hunter in the North Carolina wilderness and allow them to fend for themselves. (Kamala and her woman-beating husband, too.) I really mean that. I would do it.
Personally, I don’t believe in FEMA, nationalized flood insurance or government-run, taxpayer-funded charity for victims of floods and storms. Those things were not in our Constitution, because we never were intended to be a socialist country. However, that’s the system we now have, and trillions have been spent on it in taxation and (indirectly) inflation. So where’s the help? None for North Carolina and Georgia, the rural areas hardest hit by these storms. They’re begging for money from the Imperial City whose priorities are 100 percent with funding illegals and foreign dictators. And just think: North Carolina and Georgia are swing states.
If the conditions are not ripe for the American version of a French Revolution RIGHT NOW, then it’s hard to imagine they ever will be. Our political rulers are undiluted scum, and they are irredeemable.
Transportation Secretary Buttigieg won’t let private planes in to the hurricane stricken rural areas. It’s either the govenrnment — or nothing — when it comes to providing aid. And (inexplicably) the government won’t provide any aid. It’s evil and sadistic beyond imagining.
While we’re at it, let’s dump Pete Buttigieg into the rain-soaked, powerless wilderness and let him fend for himself.
*******************
Lame duck puppet Biden clearly supports the dockworkers’ demand for a 65 percent increase in pay. He must know this will cause prices on goods to soar even more than the hyperinflation already fueled by the government’s unsustainable debt and spending.
If you had a plan to destroy America by bankrupting its middle class through destroying purchasing power, you would do everything Obama-Biden-Harris are doing. And millions of Americans (most of them middle class) who vote for Obama-Biden-Harris applaud their own destruction. “We may starve. But at least we won’t have Trump.”
Madness beyond the imagination of any dystopian writer or student of psychopathology.
Follow Dr. Hurd on Facebook. Search under “Michael Hurd” (Charleston SC). Get up-to-the-minute postings, recommended articles and links, and engage in back-and-forth discussion with Dr. Hurd on topics of interest. Also follow Dr. Hurd on X at @MichaelJHurd1, drmichaelhurd on Instagram, @DrHurd on TruthSocial. Dr. Hurd is also now a Newsmax Insider!
SEATTLE – Many parents within Seattle Public Schools are flabbergasted by the district’s decision to shut down 11 schools dedicated to highly capable learners.
They include three elementary, five middle schools, and three high schools. The “cohorts” at these schools keep the students together so teachers can focus on their advanced needs.
There are hundreds of students learning at these schools, far above their grade level.
According to the district’s website, starting this fall, all neighborhood schools will start to incorporate highly-capable students.
The district’s plan is to completely phase out “cohorts” by the 2027-2028 school year.
The website says students will not be separated into “cohorts” and will go to neighborhood classrooms in order to address “historical inequity.”
Typically, these schools have more white and Asian students, and other races are underrepresented.
Fox News previously reported that the school district’s gifted program was among the least diverse in the country.
Parents at Cascadia Elementary say progress has been made in recent years with more enrollment of underrepresented kids into their school.
Mom Simrin Parmar says she wholeheartedly supports the goal of equity, but she believes the move will make things worse, not better.
“It will not help those kids to just cut the program wholesale. We weren’t servicing enough of them. You don’t help by cutting the program. What we should be doing is identifying more children from underrepresented groups that aren’t getting a fair shake in the testing and doing more to fix that and providing these services to more kids across the city,” Parmar said.
She says the district should look to expand diversity within the gifted program.
“They are thriving, they are learning so much. They are curious and they are being pushed” Parmar said.
Parmar also says the HC model serves kids of all different backgrounds and challenges.
“I can say there are children who will test gifted academically but then again they have other learning disabilities, ADHD, dyslexia, other related more serious disability” Parmar said.
“If they do this, it will be the bell curve getting ignored and watering down the teaching,” parent Eric Feeny said.
The district on its website promising the program is not over, that it will get better.
“All teachers will provide teaching and learning that is delivered with universal design for learning (UDL) and differentiated to meet the needs of students within their grade level,” the website said of the decision.
But there are still so many unanswered questions on how the district will provide that differentiated learning in real time with one teacher.
“I think the district consistently under-communicates most of its initiative, partially because they don’t have the bandwidth,” Feeny said.
From a budget perspective, parents also say the changes don’t make sense. Parmar says it costs the district around $7,000 per Cascadia Elementary student, which is about 50% less than many neighboring schools.
“SPS is scrapping all HC programming and replacing it with empty promises, zero plan, and zero funding. I’m sad to watch so many families leave the public school system, but I can’t blame them,” Kiley Riffell said on social media.
Riffell has two daughters who attend Cascadia. She says it’s been a game changer due to an emphasis on innovation and a deeper level of instruction.
Unless there are significant resources pumped into every classroom, parents say teachers will be overburdened with large class sizes and dramatic differences in academic needs.
“Until you have a better system, don’t give out a fake system or half solution,” Feeny said.
Many students who are already in the HC program will be able to continue on with higher learning for now. The district’s decision is not immediate but it will impact current kindergartners.
FOX 13’s request for an interview with Superintendent Dr. Brent Jones or anyone else with the district has gone unanswered.
Hurricane Helene makes the ILA action ‘simply unacceptable.’
Florida’s Governor is launching a potential end-run around a work stoppage by the International Longshoremen’s Association, saying cargo ships bringing imports that aren’t being offloaded can bring their goods to Florida.
“There are ships that have nothing to do with these negotiations. They may need a place to be able to come and we just want to send the message: You can come to the state of Florida,” Gov. Ron DeSantis said during a media availability in Anna Maria.
The Governor said the Florida National Guard and Florida State Guard “will be deployed to critical ports, affected to maintain order and if possible, resume operations which would otherwise be shut down during this interruption.”
Additionally, the Florida Department of Transportation “is coordinating calls with seaport rail and trucking partners to ensure that all are prepared and positioned appropriately to limit disruptions to the supply chain and other areas,” per DeSantis.
As he did during comments Wednesday on the labor stoppage by dockworkers, DeSantis argued that it was “simply unacceptable” to strike given that action “could negatively impact people” who are working to rebuild after Hurricane Helene with imported goods.
He also blamed the White House for not intervening against the interests of the union, saying Joe Biden and Kamala Harris should “do everything in their power to ensure that these goods are where we need to be, that people are not left hanging out in the cold, waiting for these goods if they’re sitting in the ocean somewhere and they’re not being able to be used here in the state of Florida or in Georgia or North Carolina or where people are going t
The Trump campaign blasted Vice President Kamala Harris on Thursday over the lack of funds at the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), saying that the Democrat presidential nominee prioritized spending on illegal aliens over American citizens.
“FEMA has run out of money for the rest of hurricane season because Kamala Harris used the funds for free giveaways to illegal immigrants,” Karoline Leavitt, national press secretary for the Trump campaign said in a statement. “This is inexcusable and yet another example of Kamala Harris putting Americans LAST!”
Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas told reporters on Wednesday that FEMA can meet immediate needs in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene, but does not have enough money in its coffers to make it through hurricane season.
“We are meeting the immediate needs with the money that we have. We are expecting another hurricane hitting,” Mayorkas said on Air Force One. “FEMA does not have the funds to make it through the season.”
The federal agency is being stretched thin as it works with states to assess the storm damage and provide food, water, generators and other much-needed supplies. After making landfall in Florida last week, Helene cut a path of destruction through several other states in the Southeast, triggering cataclysmic flooding and killing upwards of 160 people.
While Mayorkas did not specify how much additional money FEMA may require, his remarks echoed concerns voiced by President Joe Biden and some lawmakers earlier this week that Congress may need to pass a supplemental spending bill to assist states with their recovery efforts.
Hurricane season runs from June 1 to Nov. 30, but most hurricanes occur in September or October.
Congress recently made $20 billion available for FEMA’s disaster relief fund as part of the stopgap spending bill that will fund the federal government through Dec. 20. The bill also provided FEMA with the flexibility to access the money more quickly as needed.
Lawmakers in both chambers of Congress are scheduled to be in their home states and districts until after the November election, however, as they focus on campaigning.
House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., gave no indication he was considering changing that schedule during a speech on Tuesday. He said that Congress just provided FEMA with the funds it needs to respond to the disaster and that lawmakers would ensure those resources are appropriately allocated.
A bipartisan group of senators from affected states wrote their leadership this week saying it is clear that Congress must act to meet the needs of constituents. They said that may even require Congress to return to Washington ahead of schedule in October.
Complicating the issue, the Biden-Harris administration fears that Trump could scuttle its green agenda if he wins the presidential election and is racing to spend the tens of billions of dollars earmarked for climate initiatives.
“The Biden-Harris administration is trying to get this money out the door and get it fully obligated,” Katie Harris, of BlueGreen Alliance, a coalition of union and environmental groups, said.
J.D. Vance will be a great candidate for 2028…if there’s still an America.
**************
Kamala’s husband reportedly knocked his ex-girlfriend around brutally. Of course he did. He’s a parasite married to a professional parasite. They’re totalitarians. They rely on the use of force against others, and the submission of others, to get everything they desire. Their souls are stone cold. That’s why they’re in government, and why they are career politicians. To glorified mobsters with few or no human values, knocking around a romantic partner is nothing.
**************
Will Tim Walz be their next puppet in 2028 or 2032? Don’t laugh. They installed Biden.
**************
A meme says:
“You are voting for Kamala Harris because you hate Donald Trump.
We are voting for Trump because we love our country.
That’s the difference.
We are not the same.”
Amen.
Follow Dr. Hurd on Facebook. Search under “Michael Hurd” (Charleston SC). Get up-to-the-minute postings, recommended articles and links, and engage in back-and-forth discussion with Dr. Hurd on topics of interest. Also follow Dr. Hurd on X at @MichaelJHurd1, drmichaelhurd on Instagram, @DrHurd on TruthSocial. Dr. Hurd is also now a Newsmax Insider!
The Biden administration’s approach to Iran destabilized the Middle East and led to the October 7 Hamas attack and subsequent regional chaos.
When Joe Biden became president, the Middle East was calm. Now it is in the midst of a multifront war. So quiet was the inheritance from the prior Trump administration that nearly three years later, on September 29, 2023—and just eight days before the October 7 Hamas massacre of Israelis—Biden’s national security advisor Jack Sullivan could still brag that “The Middle East region is quieter today than it has been in two decades.”
So, what exactly happened to the inherited calm that led to the current nonstop chaos of the present?
In a word, theocratic Iran—the nexus of almost all current Middle East terrorism and conflict—was unleashed by Team Biden after having been neutered by the Trump administration.
The Biden-Harris administration adopted a 5-step revisionist protocol that appeased and encouraged Iran and its terrorist surrogates Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis.
The result was a near guarantee that something akin to the October 7 massacres would inevitably follow—along with a subsequent year of violence that has now engulfed the Middle East.
First, on the 2020 campaign trail, Biden damned long-time American ally Saudi Arabia as a “pariah.”
Almost immediately followed continuous Houthi attacks on international shipping, Israel, and U.S. warships—rendering the Red Sea, the entryway to the Suez Canal, de facto closed to international maritime transit.
Worse still, by the time of the 2022 midterms, when spiraling gas prices threatened Democratic congressional majorities, Biden opportunistically flipped and implored Saudi Arabia to pump more oil to lower world prices before the November election. Appearing obnoxious and then obsequious to an old Middle East ally is a prescription for regional chaos.
Second, Biden-Harris nihilistically killed off the Trump administration’s “Abraham Accords.” That diplomatic breakthrough had proven a successful blueprint for moderate Arab nations to seek détente with Israel, ending decades of hostilities to unite against the common Middle East threat of Iran.
Third, Biden begged Iran to reenter the appeasing, so-called Iran Deal that virtually had ensured that Iran would eventually get the bomb.
Worse yet, it dropped oil sanctions against the theocracy, allowing a near-destitute Iran to recoup $100 billion in profits. And it greenlighted $6 billion in hostage ransoms to Tehran.
An enriched Tehran immediately sent billions of dollars in support and weapons to the anti-Western terrorists of Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis to attack Israel, Americans, and international shipping. Iran soon began partnering with China and Russia to form a new anti-American axis.
Biden-Harris also fled abruptly from Afghanistan, abandoning billions in weapons and American contractors. The humiliation thus virtually destroyed American deterrence in the Middle East, inciting enemies and endangering friends.
Fourth, Biden-Harris restored hundreds of millions of dollars in aid to the West Bank and Gaza, but without any guarantees that the Palestinian Authority and Hamas would desist from their past serial terrorist acts.
In the case of Hamas, U.S. and Western “humanitarian aid” simply freed up more fungible dollars in Gaza to arm Hamas and to expand its subterranean tunnel complex essential to its October 7 massacres and hostage-taking.
Fifth, from the outset of the ensuing increased tensions, Biden-Harris began pressuring the Israelis to act “proportionally” in responding to the massacre of some 1,200 Israelis and nearly 20,000 missiles, rockets, and drones launched at their homeland from Iran, the Houthis, Hamas, and Hezbollah.
Such straitjacketing of our closest Middle East friend further signaled the Iranian-backed terrorists that there was now “daylight” between the U.S. and its closest regional ally. That opportunity provided still further incentives for Iran to test just how far it could safely go in attacking Israel.
But why did Biden-Harris so foolishly ignite the Middle East?
In part, the administration naively tried to resurrect the old, discredited Obama administration notion of ‘creative tension’—of empowering a rogue Iran and its terrorists to play off Israel and the moderate Arab regimes, as a new sort of balance of power in the region.
In part, Biden-Harris was caving to increased anti-Semitism at home and the rise of powerful, pro-Palestinian groups on U.S. campuses and in critical swing Electoral College states.
In part, Biden-Harris was naïve and gullible. The two bought into the anti-Americanism and anti-Israel boilerplate of our enemies. So, they thought to make amends by seeing Iran and its terrorists as the moral equivalent of democratic, pro-American Israel.
Their malignant legacy is the current Middle East disaster.
Victor Davis Hanson is a distinguished fellow of the Center for American Greatness and the Martin and Illie Anderson Senior Fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution. He is an American military historian, columnist, a former classics professor, and scholar of ancient warfare. He has been a visiting professor at Hillsdale College since 2004, and is the 2023 Giles O’Malley Distinguished Visiting Professor at the School of Public Policy, Pepperdine University. Hanson was awarded the National Humanities Medal in 2007 by President George W. Bush, and the Bradley Prize in 2008. Hanson is also a farmer (growing almonds on a family farm in Selma, California) and a critic of social trends related to farming and agrarianism. He is the author of the just released New York Times best seller, The End of Everything: How Wars Descend into Annihilation, published by Basic Books on May 7, 2024, as well as the recent The Second World Wars: How the First Global Conflict Was Fought and Won, The Case for Trump, and The Dying Citizen.
Notable Replies
Maximus-CassiusOctober 3, 2024Good, concise analysis by Professor Hanson, but toward the end he uses the words “naivete” and “naively” to define the Biden-Harris motivations behind their insane and malevolent Middle-East policy.Whatever else may be driving this administration’s policies–both domestic and foreign–it most assuredly is not naivete or gullibility. In fact, the driving force behind everything the Biden-Harris junta does is the inverse to Hanlon’s Law which states; Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.
Get the news corporate media won’t tell you. Turn on browser notifications now.AllowCancel
He overturned the policies of both the previous Obama and Trump administrations by siding with the Iranian-supplied terrorist Houthis in their war on Saudi Arabia.
Biden accused the kingdom of war crimes, warning it would “be held accountable” for its actions in Yemen. Biden-Harris took the murderous Houthis off the U.S. terrorist list.
Biden-Harris also fled abruptly from Afghanistan, abandoning billions in weapons and American contractors. The humiliation thus virtually destroyed American deterrence in the Middle East, inciting enemies and endangering friends.
Fourth, Biden-Harris restored hundreds of millions of dollars in aid to the West Bank and Gaza, but without any guarantees that the Palestinian Authority and Hamas would desist from their past serial terrorist acts.
In the case of Hamas, U.S. and Western “humanitarian aid” simply freed up more fungible dollars in Gaza to arm Hamas and to expand its subterranean tunnel complex essential to its October 7 massacres and hostage-taking.
Fifth, from the outset of the ensuing increased tensions, Biden-Harris began pressuring the Israelis to act “proportionally” in responding to the massacre of some 1,200 Israelis and nearly 20,000 missiles, rockets, and drones launched at their homeland from Iran, the Houthis, Hamas, and Hezbollah.
Such straitjacketing of our closest Middle East friend further signaled the Iranian-backed terrorists that there was now “daylight” between the U.S. and its closest regional ally. That opportunity provided still further incentives for Iran to test just how far it could safely go in attacking Israel.
But why did Biden-Harris so foolishly ignite the Middle East?
In part, the administration naively tried to resurrect the old, discredited Obama administration notion of ‘creative tension’—of empowering a rogue Iran and its terrorists to play off Israel and the moderate Arab regimes, as a new sort of balance of power in the region.
In part, Biden-Harris was caving to increased anti-Semitism at home and the rise of powerful, pro-Palestinian groups on U.S. campuses and in critical swing Electoral College states.
In part, Biden-Harris was naïve and gullible. The two bought into the anti-Americanism and anti-Israel boilerplate of our enemies. So, they thought to make amends by seeing Iran and its terrorists as the moral equivalent of democratic, pro-American Israel.
Their malignant legacy is the current Middle East disaster.
Victor Davis Hanson is a distinguished fellow of the Center for American Greatness and the Martin and Illie Anderson Senior Fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution. He is an American military historian, columnist, a former classics professor, and scholar of ancient warfare. He has been a visiting professor at Hillsdale College since 2004, and is the 2023 Giles O’Malley Distinguished Visiting Professor at the School of Public Policy, Pepperdine University. Hanson was awarded the National Humanities Medal in 2007 by President George W. Bush, and the Bradley Prize in 2008. Hanson is also a farmer (growing almonds on a family farm in Selma, California) and a critic of social trends related to farming and agrarianism. He is the author of the just released New York Times best seller, The End of Everything: How Wars Descend into Annihilation, published by Basic Books on May 7, 2024, as well as the recent The Second World Wars: How the First Global Conflict Was Fought and Won, The Case for Trump, and The Dying Citizen.
The air raid alerts in Israel came after a day of rocket and missile attacks from Lebanon, where Israel said it had begun limited ground operations against Hezbollah.
Israeli airstrikes and artillery fire pounded southern Lebanese villages where people were ordered to evacuate, and Hezbollah militants responded by firing a barrage of rockets into Israel. There was no immediate word on casualties as fighting intensified and concerns of a wider regional war grew.
A senior White House official warned of “severe consequences” should Iran launch a ballistic missile against Israel. U.S. ships and aircraft are positioned in the region to assist Israel in the event of an attack from Iran. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence.
He urged the public to stay close to sheltered areas. “The Iranian strike could be widespread. Following Home Front Command guidelines can save lives,” he said.
Iranian officials could not be immediately reached for comment.
Iran launched an unprecedented direct attack on Israel in April, but few of its projectiles reached their targets. Many were shot down by a U.S.-led coalition, while others apparently failed at launch or crashed in flight.
While Hezbollah denied Israeli troops had entered Lebanon, the Israeli army announced it had also carried out dozens of ground raids into southern Lebanon going back nearly a year. Israel released video footage purporting to show its soldiers operating in homes and tunnels where Hezbollah kept weapons.
If true, it would be another humiliating blow for Iran-backed Hezbollah, the most powerful armed group in the Middle East. Hezbollah has been reeling from weeks of targeted strikes that killed its leader, Hassan Nasrallah, and several of his top commanders.
On Tuesday morning, Israel warned people to evacuate to the north of the Awali River, some 36 miles from the border and much farther than the Litani River, which marks the northern edge of a U.N.-declared zone intended to serve as a buffer between Israel and Hezbollah after their 2006 war.
The border region has largely emptied out over the past year as the two sides have traded fire. But the scope of the evacuation warning raised questions as to how deep Israel plans to send its forces into Lebanon.
An Israeli airstrike hit a residential building near Beirut on Tuesday, causing damage but with no immediate reports of casualties. The strike appeared to hit an apartment about 100 meters from the Iranian Embassy.
Anticipating more rocket attacks from Hezbollah, the Israeli army announced new restrictions on public gatherings and closed beaches in northern and central Israel. The military also said it was calling up thousands more reserve soldiers to serve on the northern border.
A reporter saw Israeli troops operating near the border in armored trucks, with helicopters circling overhead, but could not confirm ground forces had crossed into Lebanon.
Ahead of the Israeli announcement of an incursion, U.S. officials on Monday said Israel had described launching small ground raids inside Lebanon as it prepared for a wider operation.
Neither the Lebanese army nor a U.N. peacekeeping force that patrols southern Lebanon have confirmed that Israeli forces entered. The U.N. force said a cross-border operation would be a violation of Lebanese sovereignty.
Hezbollah spokesman Mohammed Afif dismissed what he said were “false claims” of an Israeli incursion. He said Hezbollah is ready for “direct confrontation with enemy forces that dare to or try to enter Lebanon.”
Hagari claimed troops were conducting “localized ground raids” on Hezbollah positions in southern Lebanon to ensure Israeli citizens could return to their homes in the north.
“We’re not going to Beirut,” he said.
Israel has said it will continue to strike Hezbollah until it is safe for citizens to return. Hezbollah has promised to keep firing rockets into Israel until there is a cease-fire in Gaza.
He said Israel had carried out dozens of small raids inside Lebanon since Oct. 8, when Hezbollah began firing rockets into Israel after the outbreak of the war in Gaza.
Hagari said Israeli forces had crossed the border to collect information and destroy Hezbollah infrastructure, including tunnels and weapons. Israel has said Hezbollah was preparing its own Oct. 7-style attack into Israel. It was not immediately possible to confirm those claims.
An Israeli military official said troops participating in the latest incursion were within walking distance of the border, focused on villages hundreds of yards rom Israel. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity in line with military regulations, said there had been no clashes with Hezbollah fighters.
The Israeli military was accused of lying to media in 2021 when it released a statement implying ground troops had entered Gaza. The military played down the incident as a misunderstanding, but well-sourced military commentators in Israel said it was part of a ruse to lure Hamas into battle.
The Israeli military official said Hezbollah had launched rockets at central Israel, setting off air raid sirens and wounding a man. Hezbollah said it fired salvos of a new kind of medium-range missile at the headquarters of two Israeli intelligence agencies near Tel Aviv.
The Israeli military official said Hezbollah had also launched projectiles at Israeli communities near the border, targeting soldiers without wounding anyone.
Hezbollah began firing rockets into northern Israel shortly after Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack into Israel ignited the war in Gaza. Israel has launched retaliatory airstrikes and the conflict has steadily escalated. In recent weeks Israel has unleashed a punishing wave of airstrikes across large parts of Lebanon.
Hagari said the U.N. Security Council resolution that ended the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah war had not been enforced and that southern Lebanon was “swarming with Hezbollah terrorists and weapons.”
That resolution called for Hezbollah to withdraw from the area between the border and the Litani River and for the Lebanese army and U.N. peacekeepers to patrol the region. Israel says those and other provisions were never enforced. Lebanon has long accused Israel of violating other terms of the resolution.
The military statements indicated Israel might focus its ground operation on the narrow strip along the border, rather than launching a larger invasion aimed at destroying Hezbollah, as it has attempted in Gaza against Hamas.
Hezbollah and Hamas are close allies backed by Iran, and each escalation has raised fears of a wider war in the Middle East that could draw in Iran and the United States, which has rushed military assets to the region in support of Israel.
Israeli strikes have killed over 1,000 people in Lebanon over the past two weeks, nearly a quarter of them women and children, according to the Health Ministry. Hundreds of thousands have fled their homes.
Hezbollah is a well-trained militia, believed to have tens of thousands of fighters and an arsenal of 150,000 rockets and missiles. The last round of fighting in 2006 ended in a stalemate, and both sides have spent the past two decades preparing for their next showdown.
Recent airstrikes wiping out most of Hezbollah’s top leadership and the explosions of hundreds of pagers and walkie-talkies belonging to Hezbollah indicate Israel has infiltrated deep inside the group’s upper echelons.
The group’s acting leader, Naim Kassem, said in a televised statement Monday that Hezbollah commanders killed in recent weeks have already been replaced.
As the fighting intensifies, European countries have begun pulling their diplomats and citizens out of Lebanon.
THE ARTFUL DILETTANTE 