Important Takeaways:
- Israel beefs up air defenses, calls up troops as Iran payback for Syria strike looms
- Speculation suggests Iran could attack Israel from its own territory rather than through proxies, sparking wider hostilities
- Both Iran and its proxy Hezbollah have vowed that Israel will not go unpunished for the Monday attack on a consular building next to Iran’s embassy in Damascus, which killed Mohammad Reza Zahedi, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ most senior official in Syria, along with his deputy, five other IRGC officers, and at least one member of the Hezbollah terror group.
- Zahedi was reportedly responsible for the IRGC’s operations in Syria and Lebanon, for Iranian militias there, and for ties with Hezbollah, and was thus the most senior commander of Iranian forces in the two countries.
- The IRGC is a US-designated terrorist organization.
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Important Takeaways:
- A Lebanese migrant who was caught sneaking over the border admitted he’s a member of Hezbollah, he hoped to make a bomb, and his destination was New York
- Basel Bassel Ebbadi, 22, was caught by the US Border Patrol on March 9 near El Paso, Texas
- Ebbadi said in a sworn interview after his arrest that he had trained with Hezbollah for seven years and served as an active member guarding weapons locations for another four years
- Ebbadi’s training focused on “jihad” and killing people “that was not Muslim,” he said.
- Border agents continue to see a surge in migrants whose names appear on the terror watchlist entering the US illegally as crossings continue at record levels.
- Border agents recorded 98 encounters with terror watchlisted individuals at both the northern and southern borders in fiscal year 2022, and almost twice as many, 172, in fiscal year 2023, which ends Sept. 30.
- So far, in the first four months of 2024, 59 people have been apprehended, according to federal data.
- “The federal government has failed to enact border security measures, and the state of Texas, through Gov. [Greg] Abbott’s Operation Lone Star, will continue to take unprecedented action to help secure the border,” DPS Lt. Chris Olivarez said.
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Important Takeaways:
- Israel’s foreign minister warned time’s running short to find a diplomatic solution to the presence of Hezbollah fighters along the country’s northern border with Lebanon.
- Hezbollah, a Shiite militant group backed by Iran, and Israeli forces have exchanged fire almost daily since the Israel-Hamas war erupted on Oct. 7. While those skirmishes have killed scores of people and forced almost 100,000 Israelis and thousands of Lebanese to evacuate their homes, neither side has escalated its operations.
- Israel has said, though, that it’s prepared to open another front with a military attack on southern Lebanon if Hezbollah doesn’t move back to about 20 miles (32 kilometers) from the border, as per the terms of a long-standing United Nations resolution.
- Hezbollah has expressed solidarity with Hamas and fired missiles, mortars and rockets into Israel. The Israeli military has responded with artillery fire and also assassinated senior Hezbollah figures.
- Hezbollah is the most powerful militia in the Middle East. It has an arsenal of more than 100,000 rockets and missiles, according to Israeli intelligence estimates, far bigger than what Hamas could muster before Oct. 7.
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Important Takeaways:
- As war creeps closer to Armageddon, the end of days doesn’t seem so far away
- From Megiddo’s hilltop, there is a great view of the West Bank, no more than two miles away.
- To the north, the rockets of Hezbollah – in total about 160,000 of them – are pointed in this direction while in the south, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) are fighting raging gun battles with Hamas in a war that’s almost four months long.
- Israel is on edge. Standing in Megiddo, right in the middle of the country and now home to a vast archaeological site, there is a sense of foreboding that pervades the region.
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Important Takeaways:
- Israeli hospitals near Lebanon border preparing for ‘desert island’ scenarios
- A massive attack by Hezbollah could leave the medical centers for days without access to equipment, medicine or food, as well as staff in the reserves
- The Israeli Health Ministry ordered hospitals in the north to be ready to receive thousands of wounded, under extraneous conditions, as fighting intensifies on Israel’s border with Lebanon, according to a report by Kan.
- The Ziv Hospital in Safed and the Galilee Medical Center in Nahariya started preparing for what has been described as a “desert island” situation, meaning days without equipment, medicines or food in the event of a massive Hezbollah attack.
- The hospitals in Safed and Nahariya have also been instructed to prepare for the transfer of patients to other medical centers. Furthermore, the Health Ministry advised an increased vigilance and preparedness in all hospital systems and health insurance funds across the country.
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Important Takeaways:
- How Israel’s war with Hamas is spiraling across the Middle East: As terror group’s deputy leader is killed in Beirut drone strike and targets are hit in Syria, fears grow of much wider regional conflict
- Israel’s assassination of Hamas deputy leader Saleh al-Arouri in a drone strike in Lebanon’s capital Beirut on Tuesday has raised fears that the war in Gaza could spread beyond the Palestinian enclave and engulf the Middle East.
- Arouri, 57, was the first senior Hamas political leader to be assassinated since Israel launched a brutal air and ground offensive against the group almost three months ago on the heels of the ruthless October 7 attacks on Israeli towns.
- Lebanon’s heavily armed Hezbollah group, a powerful Hamas ally, previously vowed to strike back against any Israeli targeting of Palestinian officials in Lebanon, and said of the attack: ‘This crime will never pass without response and punishment.’
- Hezbollah and the Israeli military have been exchanging fire almost daily over the Israeli-Lebanese border since Israel’s military campaign in Gaza began, but so far the Lebanese group has appeared reluctant to dramatically escalate the fighting.
- A significant response now could send the conflict spiraling into all-out war on Israel’s northern border.
- Meanwhile, Nasser Kanaani, spokesperson for the foreign ministry of Iran – the chief backer of Hamas and Hezbollah – said Arouri’s killing would ‘undoubtedly ignite another surge in the veins of resistance and the motivation to fight against the Zionist occupiers.
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Important Takeaways:
- Day 84, 1,400+ Israel’s Killed, 129 Hostages still being held
- Israeli Official Warns Time Running Out For Lebanon To Stop Hezbollah, Raising Fears Of 2nd War Front
- “The hourglass for a political settlement is running out,” Gantz told reporters.
- “If the world and Lebanon’s government will not work to stop the shooting at Israel and to distance Hezbollah from the border, the IDF (Israel Defense Forces) will do so.”
- Hezbollah, a heavily militarized terrorist organization, holds a strong grip over southern Lebanon and began firing rockets into Israel a day after Hamas’ deadly October 7 attack.
- At least 11 Israelis, including four civilians, have been killed by the strikes.
- Around 150 Lebanese — mostly Hezbollah terrorists and 17 civilians — have been killed by Israeli counterstrikes. Thousands of civilians have been displaced on both sides of the border.
- Gantz’s warning came after Hezbollah launched its most expansive assault yet on Wednesday, firing more rockets and drones at Israel than in any other single day since the assaults began.
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Important Takeaways:
- IDF strikes Hezbollah command center in response to border attacks from Lebanon
- The IDF says fighter jets have hit a Hezbollah military headquarters in Lebanon in response to attacks on northern Israel today, including one that left a soldier moderately wounded.
- The IDF also says it carried out artillery shelling at a number of areas near the border today, presumably to foil planned Hezbollah attacks.
- Several projectiles were fired from Lebanon at areas in northern Israel, with the IDF saying it struck the launch sites.
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Important Takeaways:
- Hezbollah says it is introducing new weapons in ongoing battles with Israeli troops
- The leader of Lebanon’s militant Hezbollah group said Saturday his fighters have introduced new weapons, including a missile with a heavy warhead in the ongoing fighting along the Lebanon-Israel border, adding that they will keep using the tense frontier to pressure Israel.
- Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah also blasted the United States over the Israel-Hamas war, saying it is the only country that can stop Israel’s wide offensive on the Gaza Strip but doesn’t do so. He said attacks on U.S. troops in Iraq and Syria, that Washington says have reached more than 40 rockets and suicide drone attacks, will continue until the war in Gaza comes to an end.
- Nasrallah’s comments came as the situation along Lebanon’s southern border continues to escalate. Hezbollah on Friday attacked northern Israel with three suicide drones after an Israeli strike in central Syria killed seven Hezbollah fighters.
- Hezbollah officials say that by attacking Israeli posts along the border, the Iran-backed group is keeping three Israeli army divisions busy at a time when Israeli troops are pushing into the Gaza Strip where more than 11,000 people have been killed over the past five weeks, according to the Hamas-run Health Ministry.
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Important Takeaways:
- Iranian Christian Leader’s ‘Absolute Armageddon’ Question: ‘What Happens if Hamas, Taliban, Hezbollah, and ISIS Join Forces?’
- Lazarus Yeghnazar, founder and president of Transform Iran, an organization that spreads the Gospel in Iran, told CBN Digital such collaborations are already unfolding
- “What happens if Hamas, Taliban, Hezbollah, and ISIS join forces? What will it force the Western countries, and the democracies, and Israel to do?” Yeghnazar asked in the clip. “A conflict, which is catastrophic, will engulf the whole region.”
- He also warned the murderous chaos will eventually come for everyone, not just Israel.
- “This is … a plague that is not only destined to obliterate Israel [but one] that will not stop until they subjugate all of us,” Yeghnazar said.
- With Iran at the center, the faith leader said “only God knows” where the chaos will end, citing a “deep root of bitterness” at the heart of such horrific actions. He also noted that Iranian officials harm, harass, and kill their own people.
- “I think this destruction is going to carry on,” he said. “You cannot get the deep root of bitterness away. You can destroy buildings.”
- And that bitterness and chaos, he said, is “deeply spiritual,” calling it a manifestation of “darkness over light.” Despite terrorists’ diabolical claims and goals, Yeghnazar said Israel won’t be wiped from the map.
- “In this type of Islamic theology, there is no peaceful coexistence, and I think the West has to understand it.”
- “I think this will end in an absolute Armageddon’” he said. “But, believe me, my sadness is not what Satan is doing, because this is already prophesied in the scripture that this will happen. My sadness is what will happen to wake up the church — what will happen to prevent the church into forgetting its own pity … introvert attitude.”
- Yeghnazar encouraged humanity to “wake up and pray together” as God performs “His own will” in the Middle East.
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