Herzog denies Israeli involvement in pager attacks and says country is 'not interested to be at war with Lebanon'
Isaac Herzog has denied any Israeli involvement in in this weeks exploding pager and walkie talkie attacks and said the country is not interested in being at war with Lebanon.
Isaac Herzog has denied any Israeli involvement in in this weeks exploding pager and walkie talkie attacks and said the country is not interested in being at war with Lebanon.
Speaking on Sky News on Sunday morning, the Israeli president warned that Israel is in a dangerous situation and that there is clearly the potential of escalating dramatically.
The comments come just days after a series of attacks in which pagers and walkie talkies used by Hezbollah members exploded simultaneously - killing at least 39 and leaving a further 3,000 injured.
Israel had made no comments regarding their involvement in the fatal attacks before this morning, where the president said he rejects out of hand any connection to this or that source of operation.
There are many enemies of Hezbollah out there, quite a few these days. Hezbollah has been choking Lebanon, destroying Lebanon, creating havoc in Lebanon again and again and again. We are here simply to defend ourselves. Thats all we do, he added.
Speaking on Sky News on Sunday, Israeli President Isaac Herzog denied any Israeli involvement in in this weeks exploding pager and walkie talkie attacks and said the country is not interested in being at war with Lebanon
A picture circulating online appears to show one of the radio devices after it detonated
Smoke billows from a house in Baalbek in east Lebanon after a reported explosion of a radio device, on September 18, 2024
Pictures purportedly showing exploded hand-held radios have been circulating online
All I would say is that just at the opening of the Olympic Games 12 Israeli children of the Druze religion were murdered by a terrible missile attack, a rocket attack by Hezbollah in Majdal Shams where they were playing football.
He added: There are terrible tragedies in this war and we never want to get there, but we have the inherent right to defend ourselves and the fact is that houses have been demolished, Israelis were killed, Muslims, Christians, Druze and Jews all in the northern part of Israel where they live peacefully.
They are evacuated from their home for a year and Hezbollah keeps on sending its missiles against our people endlessly - at the end you have the right to defend yourself.
When asked about whether Israel is now at war with Lebanon, Herzog emphasised the country is not interested to be at war with Lebanon... but Lebanon has been hijacked by a terror organisation which is also a political party called Hezbollah.
Its been armed to its teeth by the Iranian empire of evil.
We dont want to get to war. We want to bring our citizens back to their homes on the border with Lebanon.
Herzog also highlighted his disappointment in the way the new UK Government has acted towards Israel, which he claims is fighting for its existence.
He said: I have, personally, very close affinity with His Majestys Government and with Britain at large, but we also have to understand that between friends we expect friends and allies to be there for us all the time, as we are for them.
There is a sense of disappointment in Israel and I have expressed it to my friends.
The comments come after Israel and Lebanon exchanged heavy fire overnight as the IDF vowed to intensify its strikes against Hezbollah targets.
The Israeli military said it struck around 290 targets on Saturday including thousands of Hezbollah rocket launcher barrels, with the country closing down its schools and restricting gatherings in many northern areas of the country early on Sunday.
Dozens of fighter jets started extensively striking southern Lebanon following detection of Hezbollah preparing to fire toward Israeli territory, IDF spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said.
Before the evening Israeli strikes began, the IDF said earlier it had destroyed about 180 sites and thousands of [rocket] launcher barrels with strikes.
Sirens sounded throughout the night as multiple rockets and missiles were fired from Lebanon and Iraq, most of which were intercepted by Israeli aerial defence systems, the military said.
Smoke billows from the site of an Israeli strike that targeted the outskirts of the southern Lebanese village of Zibqin in the early hours of September 22, 2024
The Israeli army said that more than 100 projectiles were fired from Lebanon on September 22 and in response to the incoming fire from Hezbollah
Israeli security forces work at the site hit by a rocket fired from Lebanon, in Kiryat Bialik, northern Israel, on Sunday
Rescuers sift through the rubble at the scene of an Israeli strike that targets Beiruts southern suburbs, as search and rescue operations continue in Beirut, Lebanon
Workers inspect the damage inside a house after a missile strike on a residential neighbourhood in Kiryat Bialik, northern Israel, 22 September 2024
Some of the shells were intercepted, and fallen projectiles were located in Kiryat Bialik, Tsur Shalom and Moreshet, igniting fires in the area, said the Israeli military
Israeli men hang an Israeli flag over a damaged building that was hit by a rocket from Lebanon as emergency personnel work at a site of houses damaged following the attack, amid cross-border hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel
Medical staff move a bed of a patient to an underground emergency hospital in a parking lot at Rambam Health Care Campus, amid cross-border hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel, in Haifa, Israel, September 22, 2024
The Israeli army said more than 100 projectiles were fired from Lebanon early Sunday morning, adding fire services were working to put out blazes sparked by falling munitions.
Israeli media reported that a number of buildings were hit directly or by falling missile debris, and ambulance services said they treated some lightly injured people - no serious casualties were reported.
Hezbollah said it targeted the Israeli Ramat David Airbase with dozens of missiles in response to repeated Israeli attacks on Lebanon, the group posted on its Telegram channel early on Sunday.
In an initial response to the explosions of pagers and walkie talkies on Tuesday and Wednesday, Hezbollah also bombed the Rafael military industry complexes in northern Israel with dozens of Katyusha, Fadi-1 and Fadi-2 rockets, the group said.
The successive barrages of rocket attacks launched by Hezbollah at Ramat David are the deepest strikes it has claimed since hostilities began.
The air base and the Rafael site both appeared in drone footage Hezbollah released in recent months, in videos seen as a potential bank of targets for the group in case of widening conflict.
Iran-backed Iraqi militants in a statement also claimed an explosive drone attack on Israel early on Sunday.
Following the attacks, Israels Magen David Adom rescue service said it treated four people for shrapnel wounds, including a 76-year-old man who was moderately wounded near Haifa, where buildings were damaged and cars set on fire.
It was not immediately clear if the damage was caused by a rocket or an Israeli interceptor.
The escalating attacks come less than 48 hours after an Israeli airstrike targeting Hezbollah commanders killed at least 37 people in a suburb of the Lebanese capital, according to authorities.
Hezbollah said 16 members including senior leader Ibrahim Aqil and another commander, Ahmed Wahbi, were among those killed on Friday in the deadliest strike in nearly a year of conflict with Israel.
Smoke billowed over the Lebanese village of Zawtar overnight after a barrage of Israeli airstrikes
An excavator clears away rubble from a heavily damaged house in Kiryat Bialik in the Haifa district of Israel
Israeli security and rescue forces work at the site hit by a rocket fired from Lebanon, in Kiryat Bialik, northern Israel
First responders and Israeli security forces gather amid debris and charred vehicles in Kiryat Bialik in the Haifa district of Israel
Hezbollah said on September 22 that it targeted military production facilities and an air base near north Israels Haifa after the Israeli military pounded south Lebanon and said it targeted thousands of rocket launcher barrels
Israels army said it hit an underground gathering of Aqil and leaders of Hezbollahs elite Radwan forces, and had almost completely dismantled its military chain of command.
The attack levelled a multi-story residential building in the crowded suburb and damaged a nursery next door, a security source said.
Three children and seven women were among those killed, according to Lebanons health ministry.
Fridays strike sharply escalated the conflict and inflicted another blow on Hezbollah after two days of attacks in which pagers and walkie-talkies used by its members exploded.
The death toll in those attacks, widely believed to have been carried out by Israel, has risen to 39 with more than 3,000 injured.
In what it said was the initial retaliation for the attacks with the exploding devices, Hezbollah on Sunday posted on its Telegram channel that it had launched rockets at Israeli military-industry facilities.
Israel quickly responded, striking Hezbollah targets in Lebanon, the military said in a statement.
US national security adviser Jake Sullivan said he was worried about escalation but that the Israeli killing of a top Hezbollah leader brought justice to the group, which Washington designates a terrorist organisation.
While the risk of escalation is real, we actually believe there is also a distinct avenue to getting to a cessation of hostilities and a durable solution that makes people on both sides of the border feel secure, Sullivan told reporters.
Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati cancelled a planned trip to the U.N. General Assembly in New York.
As fears continue to rise that the conflict could break out into a full-scale war, the US State Department issued new travel advice for citizens currently in Lebanon.
The US Embassy in Beirut has urged people to depart Lebanon while commercial options still remain available, warning they were already running at reduced capacity.
The embassy added it may not be able to assist US citizens who choose to remain.
