Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu signaled to the world from the United Nations on Friday that the multiple conflicts in the Middle East were far from resolved, and he vowed to continue battling the Lebanese Hezbollah and defeat Hamas in the Gaza Strip until “total victory.”
Shortly after the prime minister spoke, blasts rocked the Lebanese capital Beirut and the Israeli military said it had struck Hezbollah’s headquarters. The attack appeared to target Hezbollah’s leader and prompted Netanyahu to cut short his trip to New York by a day and make unusual travel on the Jewish Sabbath to get home.
“Israel has every right to remove this threat and return our citizens to their home safely. And that’s exactly what we’re doing,” Netanyahu said, eliciting applause from supporters in the gallery of the General Assembly. “We’ll continue degrading Hezbollah until all our objectives are met.”
When Netanyahu entered the hall and was introduced, boos and raised voices echoed, and many delegates walked out through various exits.
Netanyahu spoke as international mediation efforts were underway to try to rein in the escalating conflict in Lebanon, where Israel has been striking Hezbollah targets intensively for the past week, sending the death toll in Lebanon soaring into the hundreds and raising fears that the conflict could spiral into all-out war.
Late Wednesday, the United States, France and other allies jointly called for an “immediate” 21-day cease-fire to allow for negotiations. Israel said Thursday that discussions were ongoing and Hezbollah hasn’t officially responded to the cease-fire proposal, but has said it won’t stop firing until the Gaza war ends.
Hezbollah began striking Israel a day after Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack in an act of solidarity with the Palestinians. The sides have exchanged relatively low-level fire since then on almost a daily basis, volleys that intensified sharply after a wave of exploding communication devices targeted Hezbollah operatives – an attack widely blamed on Israel. The fighting has displaced tens of thousands on both sides of the border.
Netanyahu defends Israel’s responses
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Netanyahu has faced increasing pressure from within his own government and from Israelis displaced by the fighting to deal Hezbollah a heavy blow. Recent strikes have targeted the group’s senior leadership.
“Just imagine if terrorists turned El Paso and San Diego into ghost towns … How long would the American government tolerate that?” he said, shaking his fist in emphasis. “Yet Israel has been tolerating this intolerable situation for almost a year. Well, I’ve come here today to say: Enough is enough.”
Netanyahu pointed a finger at Iran for being a destabilizing force in the region, noting its support for both Hamas and Hezbollah. He warned Tehran that “if you strike us, we will strike you.” As he spoke, the seats in the Iran delegation sat empty. Outside, protesters against Netanyahu and Israel’s policies demonstrated behind police barricades.
Armed with visual aids as he has been in the past, the prime minister defended his nation’s response to Hamas’ attack on Israel that triggered the war that has devastated the Gaza Strip. He said Israel had destroyed much of Hamas’ rocket arsenal, killed or captured half of its fighting force and dismantled many of its underground tunnels. He said Israel was “focused on mopping up Hamas’ remaining fighting capabilities.”
But the war in Gaza will soon stretch into its second year with still no end in sight. Multiple attempts at bringing about a cease-fire have stalled over Hamas’ demand that Israel withdraw all troops and end the war, and over Israel’s insistence on maintaining a presence in some areas. All the while, civilians have borne a staggering toll in the continuing violence; roughly 100 hostages remain captive in Gaza.
Israel’s campaign in Gaza has killed more than 41,500 Palestinians and wounded more than 96,000 others, according to the latest figures released Thursday by the Health Ministry. The ministry, part of Gaza’s Hamas government, doesn’t differentiate between civilians and combatants, but more than half the dead have been women and children, including about 1,300 children under the age of 2.
Israel has maintained its military operations are justified and are necessary to defend itself.
“This war can come to an end now. All that has to happen is for Hamas to surrender, lay down its arms and release all the hostages,” Netanyahu said. “But if they don’t – if they don’t – we will fight until we achieve total victory. Total victory. There is no substitute for it.”
His speech impacted the rest of the General Assembly
In an address steeped in talk of conflict, Netanyahu also made a lengthy appeal for Israeli relations with Saudi Arabia, echoing the content of his speech last year, when efforts toward that goal were underway. But the U.S.-backed normalization talks were derailed by Hamas’ attacks, which refocused a spotlight on Israel’s conflict with the Palestinians, casting doubt on Netanyahu’s argument that ties with Saudi Arabia are not contingent on Palestinian statehood.
As Netanyahu took the stage Friday morning, there was enough ruckus in the audience that the presiding diplomat had to shout, “Order, please.”
The two speakers who preceded Netanyahu on Friday each made a point of calling out Israel for its actions.
“Mr. Netanyahu, stop this war now,” Slovenian Prime Minister Robert Golob said as he closed his remarks, pounding the podium. And Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, speaking just before the Israeli leader, declared of Gaza: “This is not just a conflict. This is systematic slaughter of innocent people of Palestine.” He thumped the rostrum to audible applause.
It wasn’t just Friday, either. On Thursday, the leader of the Palestinian Authority and a top Lebanese official both made their cases to fellow leaders — cases that included harsh words for Israel as well. Mahmoud Abbas’ first words to the General Assembly were a sentence repeated three times in reference to Gaza: “We will not leave. We will not leave. We will not leave.” He accused Israel of destroying Gaza and making it unlivable. And Abdallah Bouhabib, Lebanon’s foreign minister, decried Israel’s “systematic destruction of Lebanese border villages.”
“The crisis in Lebanon threatens the entire Middle East,” Bouhabib said. “We wish today to reiterate our call for a cease-fire on all fronts.”
At the General Assembly late Friday evening, Iran exercised its “right of reply” at the end of the day’s regular speeches and denounced Israel as “the exclusive source of insecurity and instability in the region and beyond.”
“What you heard here today from the notorious Israeli prime minister was nothing but an unsuccessful attempt to distract attention from his genocide and brutal war crimes,” said an Iranian diplomat whose name was not immediately available. He addressed the General Assembly in English.
