Israel Isn't Ready for the Third Lebanon War -
On Wednesday I went up to the bombarded, burning north when IDF Chief of Staff Herzl Halevi announced that "Israel is approaching the point where it will have to make a decision. The IDF is ready to move into an offensive."
It so happened I was waiting in Kiryat Shmona for a meeting with a senior commander, which was put off due to Halevi's visit. A few minutes later, the car shook from two colossal explosions. As I drove south on Route 90 toward the symbolic refugee camp set up by the disheartened Galilee residents at Amiad Junction, smoke clouds covered the horizon from Hezbollah's accurate strikes on Meron's mountainside.
Smokes rises from the woods which caught fire following rockets launched from Lebanon into northern Israel, close to the city of Kiryat Shmona, on Tuesday.Credit: Jalaa Marey/AFP
I'm not a chief of staff, only a retired junior officer, a civilian and a journalist. But I beg the Israelis: don't believe Herzl. He's living in la la land. The IDF and Israel are not ready for a real war in Lebanon, which would lead to enormous destruction in the Galilee and to missile and drone attacks on Haifa and central Israel.
Let's start with the army. Our only advantage on the chief of staff is that as journalists, we talk to everyone: reservists, reservists' wives, mothers and fathers of combat soldiers in the field, senior officers who have been discharged from career service but are familiar with the information and reality.
So I'll risk stating that the IDF isn't really prepared for another war. After eight months of fighting in Gaza and high alert in the north, its resources have been stretched to the limits. Hundreds of combat soldiers have been killed. Many thousands have been wounded and mentally damaged. The combat and combat-support units are tired and worn thin. Many of the reservists have a clear motivation problem, and, since the renewal of the ground maneuver in Gaza, quite a few regular soldiers have it as well. On top of that, armament and equipment are in short supply.
For the past eight months, the residents of the shelled, humiliated north have been told to keep their heads down because the IDF is busy in Gaza. The army in its current condition isn't built to fight on two fronts. And that's without factoring in the involvement of the Houthis from Yemen, pro-Iranian militias in Iraq and even in Jordan, and a conflagration in the West Bank.
Nor does the military have an adequate response to the explosive drones or missile barrages. Or to the danger of fires, which did not take tremendous intelligence to predict. A month ago, I visited a friend in Ayelet Hashahar. "Wait for the moment the slopes and fields shift from green to yellow," he told me. "Every launch will become a blaze. We need firefighting trucks and planes here even more than security units." What every kibbutznik from the Hula Valley knows, the government and General Staff can't figure out?
An Israeli first response unit put out flames after rockets were launched from Lebanon into northern Israel, close to the city of Kiryat Shmona, on Tuesday.Credit: Jalaa Marey/AFP
Halevi made his announcement at Gibor military base. The next day, Netanyahu also slipped into the base at an uncharacteristic morning hour. He got himself photographed leaning over the maps with senior commanders and declared: "The earth burned here but also in Lebanon, we're prepared for a very powerful action."
A Burkan missile carrying half a ton of explosives fell in the base this week. The devastation was enormous. Windows shattered in Kiryat Shmona's mall also, and the explosion was heard throughout the border zone Israel has evacuated of residents. The people of the burned north find little comfort knowing that Lebanon is burning as well.
Smoke billows during Israeli bombardment on the southern Lebanese border village of Khiam on Wednesday.Credit: Rabih Daher/AFP
When more Burkans and drones are showered on them and the rest of Israelis, Netanyahu will hide in billionaire Simon Falic's bunker. He'll be happy with another war that keeps Gantz in the government while it postpones a day-after arrangement in Gaza and an investigation into the debacles of October 7.
The third Lebanon war will bring a terrible disaster on us. The chief of staff must not be dragged into it. He is right, we've reached the point where a decision must be made: to stop the fighting in the south and the north, to bring back the living and dead hostages, to stop sacrificing soldiers for nothing and to save what's left of the country.