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“It's also been an imperative for us to try to make sure that this conflict doesn't spread." US Secretary of State Antony Blinken warned Israel not to escalate its conflict with Tehran and the Iranian proxy group Hezbollah as it continues to respond militarily to attacks from both entities. “It's also been an imperative for us to try to make sure that this conflict doesn't spread. We are resolute in our defense of Israel when it comes to attacks it's receiving from Iran, from Iran's proxies,” Blinken told reporters on Wednesday morning before departing Tel Aviv for Saudi Arabia. “We...

For the second time in less than a month, senior Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard officers have been killed in a suspected Israeli airstrike in Damascus, Syria. Iran's unofficial Mehr news agency said, "The Revolutionary Guards' Syria intel chief, his deputy, and two other Guards members were martyred in the attack on Syria by Israel." Updated reports say that five IRGC officers, plus some of their Syrian counterparts, were killed in the attack. The icons are already circulating. The intelligence chief, Sadegh Omidzadeh, was a close associate of Brigadier General Sayyed Reza Mousavi, the IRGC commander in Syria, who, along with...

Amid growing fears of another Middle East war, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah has thrown down the gauntlet for Israel by vowing to hammer Ben-Gurion Airport if Beirut's Rafik Hariri International is hit, as it was in their last conflict in 2006. That was not likely an idle boast. Nasrallah was unusually specific in what targets Hezbollah would hit, thus signaling its capabilities. "He's never been as detailed and candid," said Lebanese political scientist and Hezbollah expert Amal Saad-Ghorayeb of the American University of Beirut. According to Israel's military intelligence, Hezbollah has in excess of 42,000 rockets and missiles stashed away,...

The Iranian-sponsored Hizbullah has begun deployment of new combat units in preparation for a war with Israel. Lebanese sources said Hizbullah plans to deploy thousands of combat troops trained in Iran and capable of a rapid invasion of Israel. They said many of the newly-trained troops would arrive from Iran in 2010 amid an alert for an attack by neighboring Israel. Hizbullah and IRGC tactics were said to have been used by Yemeni Shi'ite rebels during their three-month war with Saudi Arabia. In November 2009, the Believing Youth, trained by Hizbullah, captured at least two Saudi villages near the Yemeni...

Hezbollah has dispersed its long-range-rocket sites deep into northern Lebanon and the Bekaa Valley, a move that analysts say threatens to broaden any future conflict between the Islamist movement and Israel into a war between the two countries. More than 10,000 U.N. troops now patrol traditional Hezbollah territory in southern Lebanon along the Israeli border, and several thousand Lebanese armed forces personnel also have moved into the area. A cross-border raid by Hezbollah guerrillas in summer 2006 triggered a month-long war that prompted the United Nations to deploy its force as part of a cease-fire. The United Nations is confident...

BEIRUT, Lebanon - Lebanese troops began deploying south of the strategic Litani River early Thursday, a senior military official said, after the Israeli army stepped up its withdrawal from the south Lebanon region and handed over some of its positions to U.N. peacekeepers. The rapid developments aimed at ending 34 days of fighting came after Lebanon's government agreed Wednesday to deploy troops near Israel's border for the first time in 40 years. A senior official in the Lebanese army told The Associated Press around dawn Thursday that Lebanese troops, backed by tanks and other armored vehicles, had begun arriving south...

The cease-fire in the Middle East has taken effect. The Air Force, Navy, artillery and other units were ordered to halt all offensive operations. Since fighting erupted 34 days ago, 166 Israelis were killed - 114 IDF soldiers and 52 civilians. While the ceasefire agreement was "fragile," the IDF planned to uphold its side to the agreement and to suspend all offensives against the guerrilla group Monday morning, a high-ranking officer in the Northern Command told The Jerusalem Post Sunday night. On Sunday, the IDF completed taking up positions along the Litani River in preparation for the ceasefire. IDF troops...

While the ceasefire agreement with the Hizbullah was "fragile," the IDF planned to uphold its side to the agreement and to suspend all offensives against the guerrilla group Monday morning, a high-ranking officer in the Northern Command told The Jerusalem Post Sunday night. On Sunday, the IDF completed taking up positions along the Litani River in preparation for a UN-brokered ceasefire scheduled to go into effect Monday morning at 7 a.m. IDF troops operating in Lebanon, the officer said, would halt their attacks on Hizbullah strongholds in nearby villages but would maintain their positions and would be ready to "jump...

Israeli Troops Surge Into Lebanon, Engage in Some of the Heaviest Combat of the Monthlong War BEIRUT, Lebanon Aug 13, 2006 (AP)— More Israeli troops surged into southern Lebanon on Saturday, reaching the Litani River and engaging in some of the heaviest combat of the monthlong war just hours after the U.N. Security Council adopted a cease-fire plan. Israel lost 19 soldiers its highest one-day toll. The leader of the Islamic militant group Hezbollah grudgingly joined Lebanon's government in accepting the U.N. resolution but vowed to keep fighting until Israeli troops leave and hand over territory to a muscular U.N....

JERUSALEM - Israeli army units reached the Litani River on Saturday, less than 24 hours after the government ordered an operation to march toward the river in a final push against entrenched Hezbollah guerrillas, Israel Radio reported. The units were part of a massive force that flooded into Lebanon, trying to seize as much territory as possible before a U.N. cease-fire comes into effect. The objective was to control southern Lebanon up to the Litani River, about 18 miles from the Israeli border, before handing over the area to the Lebanese army and U.N. troops. Meanwhile, both sides in the...

The Israeli army launches a terrestrial operation of scale to southern Lebanon JERUSALEM - the Israeli army launched Saturday morning a terrestrial operation of scale to southern Lebanon, announced the spokesman of the army. "Conforméement with the decision Wednesday of the cabinet of safety, the Israeli army launched a terrestrial operation in the south of Lebanon which must extend to the Litani river", the spokesman indicated. "the troops on the ground will profit from an aerial cover and maritime", the spokesman added. According to the public radio, reinforcements as men and the tanks penetrated in southern Lebanon in the...

QASMIYA, Lebanon, Aug. 9 -- There are no more bridges along the 90 miles of the Litani River, dividing besieged southern Lebanon and Hezbollah's fighters from the rest of the country. One by one, Israeli forces bombed them all. So a little ways from the Mediterranean Sea, where the river's meandering waters eddy, then empty, about 20 men heaved, pushed, pulled and coaxed -- with appeals to God in between -- two water-logged trucks carrying supplies Wednesday to regions bearing the brunt of Israel's invasion. Over a few hours, Hezbollah's shadowy organization emerged on the banks of the Litani. "Don't...

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert will wait to see in which direction the diplomatic process is headed before giving the IDF a green light to implement the expanded ground operation the security cabinet approved at the end of a tense, six-hour meeting Wednesday, senior sources in the Prime Minister's Office said. According to these officials, the waiting period would be "very short." The security cabinet, by a vote of 9-0 with three abstentions, approved plans to expand the IDF ground operation to the Litani, which at some points is 30 kilometers from the border, in order to take out the Katyusha...

On Wednesday morning a reservist force operating in the village of Ayta al- Shaab killed two Hizbullah gunmen. Over the course of Wednesday night, the IAF carried out 120 airstrikes on Lebanese targets. Close to 80 buildings and headquarters of the Hizbullah were attacked. Also targeted were four rocket launchers, 25 roads, several vehicles and seven bridges, mostly along the Litani river. The IDF expects to begin moving towards the Litani river later Wednesday following a security cabinet meeting during which the IDF will ask for permission to deepen its incursion into Lebanon. Since the beginning of the hostilities the...

With the French reportedly weighing changes to the UN cease-fire resolution that would tilt it in Lebanon's favor and a "war of the generals" taking place in the Northern Command, the security cabinet is expected Wednesday morning to approve an expanded ground operation up to the Litani River, and perhaps beyond. Government sources said that the 12-person security cabinet, which Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Tuesday had so far okayed all plans the IDF had brought for approval, would not likely reject plans for a wider operation, especially amid growing public impatience with the pace of the war. Diplomatic officials...

After completing the creation of a security zone in southern Lebanon and with diplomatic pressure mounting, the IDF, senior defense officials revealed Sunday, did not plan to move ground troops northwards towards the Litani River - a line initially named as the IDF's final destination in this current ground incursion. Meanwhile Sunday, five Golani soldiers were wounded after a bomb went off when they stormed a home in the Lebanese town of Mahbeeb. The wounded soldiers were evacuated to safety and then taken to Rambam Hospital in Haifa for further medical treatment. Five other soldiers were wounded, one moderately and...

Israeli security Cabinet led by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert decided the military campaign in south Lebanon would not be expanded, and any modifications to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) operation, such as deploying more troops, would require Cabinet approval. Israel is essentially broadcasting to the world that its political and military circles are severely divided over the current operation, and it might have no choice but to cave in to diplomatic pressure to put an end to the fighting and draw up a cease-fire. This might not be true to Israeli thinking, but it is certainly a message they are...