.... The 10 minutes of destruction and terror that enveloped Beirut and other parts of Lebanon came hours after a ceasefire took effect in the joint US-Israel war on Iran – a truce that was finally extended to Lebanon last week (though the bombing continues at a lower pace). Despite the ceasefire, the Israeli military is occupying more than 50 towns in southern Lebanon and has been razing entire villages to render them uninhabitable.
Is this what war looks like now? Our world has changed over the past two and half years. In the weeks after the Hamas attacks of 7 October 2023, Israel set in motion a machinery of genocide – largely enabled by unwavering US support and powered by impunity and denial – against Gaza, unleashing one of the most destructive military campaigns targeting civilians in modern times. Israel has repeated the Gaza playbook in its war on Lebanon: intense aerial bombardment and illegal mass evacuation orders that lead to the large-scale displacement of civilians; the destruction of civilian infrastructure and border towns to make way for so-called “buffer zones” occupied by Israeli troops; the targeting of hospitals and healthcare workers; and the killing of journalists. And, as it did with Gaza, the west largely looks on with indifference.
Gaza represents a new pinnacle for this type of wholesale destruction as a military strategy, of using overwhelming and disproportionate force against civilians and infrastructure. But the seed of this strategy was planted two decades ago – in a previous Israeli war on Lebanon. That war resulted in Israel’s Dahiyeh doctrine, which calls for the deliberate targeting of civilians and infrastructure as a means of collective punishment that seeks to turn local populations against armed militias. That doctrine played out in full force in Lebanon – and also has made multiple rhetorical appearances in Donald Trump’s threats to destroy societies and civilizations on a large scale.
As long as this impunity continues, this playbook will repeat itself, constituting a new normal where the eradication of infrastructure, agriculture, cities and towns fit for habitation and entire cultures, is acceptable to much of the world as a method of war. The west’s dehumanization of Palestinians – and Lebanese, Iranians and others – has also made it possible for the aggressors to keep committing more abhorrent acts of violence.
The day before Israel unleashed its fury on Lebanon, the US president famously wrote on social media that “a whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again”.... READ MORE https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2026/apr/24/gaza-israel-lebanon-war
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