“All knowledge that is about human society, and not about the natural world, is historical knowledge, and therefore rests upon judgment and interpretation.” – Edward Said.
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Israel launches ground invasion of Lebanon
This morning, Israel commenced heavy shelling of border towns, Metulla and Marjaayoun, in Lebanon to prepare for its tanks and infantry to take lands up to Latani river. There is a possibility of an advance on Beirut itself, which is being heavily bombed.
In 1982, the butcher of Beirut, Ariel Sharon, made an assault on Beirut resulting in the withdrawal of the PLO from Lebanon and the massacre of over 3,000 Palestinians at Sabra and Shattilla refugee camps in Beirut.
– See https://www.geopolitical.report/heavy-shelling-reported-near-wazzani/
On the morning of the battle, as the forces drew up, a mujahid named Hassan remarked to his resistance leader that the size of the Israeli armoured divisions was astonishing. “There is one thing, Hassan, yet more astonishing“, his leader coolly replied, “which you take no notice of.” He then explained, “In all those great numbers before us, there is not one fighter called Hassan“, provoking laughter that spread through the the ranks of the mujahideen.
In the battles that followed the mujahideen defeated six brigades of Israeli soldiers with a smaller force of dedicated fighters, superior knowledge of the terrain, and, of course, the dreaded wire guided missiles and deep buried bombs in the mountainous terrain. Reminiscent of an historic victory by resistance fighters years before known as the July War in 2006 driving Israel out of Lebanon.
[From Livy’s description of Hannibal leading Carthaginians against the great Roman army many centuries before, known as the Battle of Cannae. Livy on the Battle of Cannae (216bc)]
In July 2024, IDF reports said their armoured division is short on tanks, and munitions after months of genocide. Israeli military says in a court filing that the Armored Corps suffered a loss of equipment that was damaged and the IDF arsenal is depleted.
Australian and Queensland government complicity. Some of the artillery shells being used in Gaza and Lebanon are being manufactured at a new plant in the coastal Queensland town of Maryborough and exported to Germany. Once there, they are filled with explosive material and receive a fuse – and after that they go into the pool of ammunition to be transferred to the IDF (some of these shells go via Ukraine. The US administration has authorised this transfer whenever there is an IDF shortage caused by the huge amount of artillery shells fired on Gaza and Lebanon).
While it is impossible to track each individual shell, some – or all – of the Australian production run will be fired against the resistance in Palestine and Lebanon. Till recently the factory’s current output is going to Germany.
This is a consequence of the ownership of the plant, which is a 51-49 joint venture between industrial giant Rheinmetall Waffe Munition and family-owned Australian company NIOA. There is a ship collecting these 155mm munitions at Point Wilson (on Thursday 3 Oct 2024) and at Port Alma (after Sunday 6 Oct 2024) this week.
While the JV is currently producing German DM121 shells at a rate of 20,000 per year, this will progressively increase because of global demand to an annual total exceeding 100,000. CEO Rob Nioa has explained that the decision to build the Maryborough factory in 2020 had the rock solid support of both Queensland and Australian governments that have contributed $90 million.
Israeli Tank on the road near Qadas is a Palestinian village located 17 kilometers northeast of Safad that was depopulated during the 1947–1949 Palestine war. Note the sign in Hebrew renaming the road to Qedesh. This was an ancient Canaanite settlement in Tel Qedesh, 3 km northeast of the modern Kibbutz Malkiya in Palestine on the on the Lebanese border.
Over a million Lebanese people have been displaced in a week. There is a lot of tension inside Lebanon. The Syrian refugee community is very worried. Over 60,000 children, mostly accompanied by their mothers, have crossed into Syria to avoid the bombardment from Israel. Lebanese authorities are in disarray. Schools have been turned into internal displacement camps. Syria has provided collective shelters for the children and their refugee mothers.
The triad of death in Gaza, malnutrition, lack of medicine, and unhygienic conditions may commence in Lebanon. Israel’s devastating bomb and campaign of Lebanon has entered its second week with troops and tanks arranged along the southern border are waiting the go ahead from the Defence Minister to invade.
People are crowded into refugee camps, car parks, schools, beaches, and wherever they can sleep in open squares. The Lebanese have to escape the bombardment and raids from F-35 planes supplied by the United States. Already there are 1.5 million Syrian refugees who are returning to Syria from Lebanon, now that the invasion has commenced.
The world food programme needs at least 100 million dollars just to feed people in Lebanon to the end of this year, only two months away.
People that can are getting on the first plane flight out to flee to London Madrid Istanbul Paris, anywhere they can go and are telling their stories of escape in the international airports of Europe.
‘The Greater Israel’ project
In 1982, the PLO was pushed into exile by Israel’s occupation of Lebanon. This led up to PLO leader Yasser Arafat signing the disastrous Oslo Accords in 1993 which sacrificed 78% of Palestinian lands to Israel and installed Israel’s occupation of Gaza and the West Bank.
Today, the IDF and Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) confirmed the assassination of Nidal Abdel-Aal, Head of the Lebanon Branch of the PFLP (Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine). Imad Odeh, who was the head of PFLP’s Military Office in Lebanon, was murdered alongside him.
land in Lebanon all the way up to the Latani river. How does the old Zionist slogan go? “From the river, to the river.”
Further Reading
Lebanon War: Some Lessons from the Setbacks of the Resistance “It is the duty of revolutionaries to soberly assess the conditions of the liberation struggle as they are and not to lend themselves to illusions. It is clear that the Lebanese resistance has suffered serious setbacks. According to the Institute for the Study of War, Israel has managed to kill 21 of 25 Hezbollah top leaders, including its historic leader Hassan Nasrallah, within a few weeks.” – Michael Pröbsting, RCIT, 1 October 2024. Read more at https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/africa-and-middle-east/lebanon-war-some-lessons-from-the-setbacks-of-the-resistance/
Ian Curr
1 Oct 2024
They might be the masters of the air, but we are masters of the Earth – Lebanese man on the invasion by Israel on 1 October 2024.
This article, Lebanon War: Some Lessons from the Setbacks of the Resistance, was already written and published when Iran initiated a counter-strike against Israel with about 200 missiles.
It goes without saying that given the unspeakable series of crimes of the Zionist army – its genocide against the Palestinian people in Gaza for nearly a year, now its brutal attacks against Lebanon and also its attacks against Iran itself – such a strike is the minimum of retaliation.
However, it does not alter the fact, as we outline in the article below, that the Iranian regime only reacts to Israel’s efforts to “reshape the Middle East”, i.e. to expel the Palestinian people and to smash all resistance forces, as late and as little as possible and only if is absolutely forced to do under the pressure of the masses and/or their enemies. (01.10.2024, UTC: 18.30)
Lebanon War: Some Lessons from the Setbacks of the Resistance “It is the duty of revolutionaries to soberly assess the conditions of the liberation struggle as they are and not to lend themselves to illusions. It is clear that the Lebanese resistance has suffered serious setbacks. According to the Institute for the Study of War, Israel has managed to kill 21 of 25 Hezbollah top leaders, including its historic leader Hassan Nasrallah, within a few weeks.” – Michael Pröbsting, RCIT, 1 October 2024. Read more at https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/africa-and-middle-east/lebanon-war-some-lessons-from-the-setbacks-of-the-resistance/
It was appalling to hear the PM saying that this week-end’s pro-Palestinian protests were a celebration of Hezbollah. According to the Lancet, “it is not implausible to estimate that up to 186 000 or even more deaths could be attributable to the current conflict in Gaza” (https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(24)01169-3/fulltext).
Apparently, Mr Albanese doesn’t think this warrants protests against Israeli terrorism on Australian streets, nor does his government utterly condemn the burning of Beirut where massive war crimes are currently underway Israel piles war crime upon war crime with impunity. It sent tiny print triggering messages to mobile phones and pagers to explode them in peoples’ faces thus blinding scores of civilians and now, having nothing left to bomb in Gaza, it accumulated 2000lb bunker busting US bombs.
Netanyahu gave the order from UN HQ in New York for 80 of them to be dropped on residential appartments in the centre of Beirut, burying an untold number of civilians.
The real terrorists are the US and its proxy Israel, who, between them, have displaced democratically elected governments and murdered millions across Central and Latin America, the Middle East, North Africa and Grenada Flying the flags of these states, particularly that of Israel, should be treated as support for terrorism.