#war + #lebanon

The letter – sent on Monday and made public on Thursday – largely focused on Israel’s conduct in Lebanon, where the Israeli military is systematically turning border towns that it has depopulated into rubble.

“The declaration of military evacuation zones has been used to permanently displace people and destroy homes and towns – acts that are in violation of international law,” the legislators wrote.

“Furthermore, no declaration of evacuation zones or ‘kill zones’ absolves Israeli and US forces from the absolute legal responsibility to determine that each individual person or civilian facility targeted by drones, jets, and gunfire is, in fact, a military target.”

Signatories to the letter include prominent progressives such as Peter Welch, Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren and Chris Van Hollen.

Chris Coons, a centrist and staunch Israel supporter, also signed.

Throughout its genocidal war on Gaza, Israel used displacement orders to depopulate large areas of the territory, and then blew up nearly every structure in the evacuated area.

Israeli officials have publicly admitted that they aim to re-create the same model in South Lebanon, creating a desolate, uninhabitable no-man’s land that would serve as a buffer zone that would not require permanent military occupation.

Israel has granted a perpetrator of war crimes in Gaza the honor of lighting a ceremonial torch on Independence Day. By choosing Rabbi Avraham Zarbiv to represent “the spirit of the nation,” Israel is making genocide part of its official national ethos.

“There’s nothing for them to go back to in Rafah and Jabalya… Tens of thousands of families have no documents, childhood photos, ID cards, homes. Nothing.” This boast was made by Rabbi Avraham Zarbiv, an Israeli Rabbi who perpetrated war crimes who has been chosen to light a torch at Israel’s Independence Day ceremony, today, April 21. This is one of the highest accolades in the country, granted to “exemplary citizens” who represent “the spirit of the nation.”

Rabbi Zarbiv served about 500 days as a military reservist in Gaza over the last two and a half years. As a bulldozer operator during the genocide, he carried out war crimes of which he has openly boasted in videos he filmed, media interviews and public talks.

Bestowing one of the highest civilian honors in Israel on a citizen who committed war crimes illustrates how deeply the dehumanization of Palestinians has taken root in the Israeli mainstream. It is yet another terrifying signal that genocide has officially become part of the national ethos. Rabbi Avraham Zarbiv is a regional rabbinical court judge for the settlement of Ariel, and head the pre-military academy in the settlement of Beit El that educates hundreds of Israeli youth. Choosing him as an “exemplary citizen” represents a state-level endorsement of the complete de-humanization of Palestinians, systematic destruction of Palestinian life and the governing logic of annihilation and ethnic cleansing in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. Zarbiv is not ashamed of his actions, neither, clearly is the State of Israel. We’vecompiled some documentation here to mark the occasion.

An extremist rabbi known for razing civilian homes in Gaza will light a torch at Israel’s independence day celebration on Tuesday, a role human rights campaigners said marked the embrace of genocide as the official “spirit of the nation”.

The footage spread so widely on social media that his name entered the lexicon of Hebrew slang. “To Zarbiv” now means to destroy, a neologism that the 54-year-old has embraced, making it the title of a lecture earlier this year.

Zarbiv’s selection for the ceremony marks an official endorsement of the dehumanisation of Palestinians and systematic destruction of Palestinian life, according to the rights group B’tselem. It said: “This selection sends a clear message to the citizens of Israel and the entire world – in Israel, genocide, ethnic cleansing and war crimes are the ‘spirit of the nation’.”

Israel's levelling of these structures comes after Defence Minister Israel Katz's order on 22 March to "accelerate the destruction of Lebanese homes" near the Israeli border based on the "model in Gaza" as part of its campaign against Hezbollah.

The systematic demolition of these towns and villages may amount to a war crime, international law experts told BBC Verify.

Katz's plan for an Israeli-controlled "security zone" extending from the border to the Litani river would take up about 10% of Lebanon's territory.

Using verified footage and analysis of available satellite imagery, BBC Verify found evidence of controlled Israeli demolitions in at least seven border towns and villages.

We found more than 460 buildings had been demolished in Aita al-Shaab alone. Excavators and armoured vehicles can also be seen in satellite imagery of the village, according to Tony Reeves, founder of intelligence analysis firm MAIAR.

The deliberate demolition of structures is not a new Israeli military tactic. It has been deployed across swathes of Gaza during the war that was triggered by the Hamas-led attack on Israel on 7 October 2023.

Multiple legal experts told BBC Verify the destruction of property is strictly prohibited by international humanitarian law, unless it is demanded by military necessity. The bar for necessity is higher than military convenience or advantage, according to Prof Janina Dill, a global security and international law expert at Oxford University: "It certainly does not cover levelling entire villages as a predicate to long-term national security." It also requires case-by-case analysis when determining which buildings have military significance, said Yuval Shany, a legal expert from the Israel Democracy Institute think tank. The capacity of some civilian buildings to be used for military activity "does not justify a sweeping policy of creating buffer zones next to the border inside which all buildings are to be destroyed", he added.

Dr Lawrence Hill-Cawthorne, co-director of the Centre for International Law at the University of Bristol, reiterated that the "fundamental rule of law" is that civilian objects must not be targeted. "It is not a permissible defence to claim that the total destruction of towns and villages in southern Lebanon is necessary for creating a buffer zone to hold back Hezbollah," he said. "Even if Israel's war in Lebanon can be considered self-defence against attacks from Hezbollah, its conduct seems to go far beyond a limited war of self-defence against specific attacks."

Similar to IDF's current Gaza model, the defense establishment intends to destroy villages near the Israel-Lebanon border, and establish permanent military outposts in the area between the border and the Litani River

The defense establishment's perception is that all of these villages are used by Hezbollah for activities against Israel, and therefore they must be completely destroyed to prevent Hezbollah operatives from returning to the area.

“We have ordered an acceleration in the destruction of Lebanese homes in contact-line villages to neutralize threats to Israeli communities, in accordance with the model of Beit Hanoun and Rafah in Gaza,” Katz said, referring to border towns that were largely obliterated.

Lebanese returned to find homes, infrastructure and some entire villages destroyed. Israel said it had dismantled Hezbollah infrastructure that could have been used to launch an Oct. 7-style attack, and it continued to strike what it said were militant targets on a near-daily basis after the truce.

In the latest fighting, Israel has launched blistering air raids across Lebanon, killing more than 1,000 people — mostly outside of the border area — and displacing over a million.