Tel Aviv, January 24: Israel is heading toward a new war with Lebanon’s Shiite movement Hezbollah, a cabinet minister warned Saturday in remarks carried by military radio and the Ynet news website.
“We are heading toward a new confrontation in the north but I don’t know when it will happen, just as we did not know when the second Lebanon war would erupt,” said Yossi Peled, a minister without portfolio and a reserve army general.
He was referring to the devastating war Israel fought with Hezbollah in 2006, which killed more than 1,200 Lebanese, most of them civilians, and more than 160 Israelis, mostly soldiers.
However, Israeli flights over Lebanon occur on an almost daily basis and are in breach of UN Security Council resolution 1710, which in August 2006 ended the war.
Hezbollah is part of a new coalition government formed in November by Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri.
“Although Hezbollah is part of the Lebanese government, the latter has no influence on it,” Peled said.
“Unlike many others (officials) I consider that peace is not a goal in itself but only a means to guarantee our existence,” said Peled.
But in a statement issued on Saturday after Peled made his comments, hardline Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed that “Israel does not wish at all to have a confrontation with Lebanon.”
Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah warned Israel on Friday against launching a new war against Lebanon.
Nasrallah said that Israel was again beating the drums of war to try to restore its military’s reputation as an invincible regional force.
Hezbollah, originally a resistance group formed to counter an Israeli occupation of south Lebanon, had forced the Israeli military out of Lebanon in 2000. Israel, however, continues to occupy the Lebanese Shabaa Farms.
—Agencies