I waited a few days to see if the ceasefire would hold, and surprisingly mostly it has held and we can happily report that no rockets or missiles have been fired from Lebanon into Israel since November 26th. (As of December 3rd)
France are screaming that Israel is violating the ceasefire, but the terms did allow for Israel to prevent the rearming of Hezbollah and monitor their movements ensuring they stay behind the Litani River and adhering to the UN resolution 1701, which was put in place to bring an end to the Israel/Lebanon war of 2006. It also called for the disarmament of armed groups and for the Lebanese to take control of their country.
We have read a lot about UNIFIL recently after they complained about being fired upon, but they had failed in their mission, sat back and allowed Hezbollah to amass up to 200,000 missiles. They further allowed the terrorists to operate from close to the UNIFIL bases. It is difficult to know how many missiles remain in the hands of Hezbollah since they fired thousands upon Israel. It is also difficult to know how many hands the Hezbollah have left after Israel blew their leaders to pieces with that ingenious pager attack.
For the moment, however, they have agreed to a ceasefire , as they have been so severely decimated by the IDF . We will only have peace if they are prevented from re-arming and occupying the southern villages of Lebanon.
The developments in Syria are very interesting as Syria sits as the gateway for Hezbollah’s weapons from Iran into Lebanon. Chaos in Syria has seen Aleppo falling into the hands of the rebels damaging Iranian infrastructures in the country. Hezbollah will now need to use their condensed forces to help protect the Assad regime . Anarchy on the border is never good news, but the Syrian Rebel leader Abu Tow made a statement to the Israeli public broadcaster Kann that they have no argument with Israel and that they share a common enemy in the Mullahs of Iran. Israel, however, is aware that the rebels could consolidate and turn their weapons on Israel. It is a situation they must monitor very closely .
The news is full of statements and numbers . The best statement this week has been from President Elect Trump, who is trying to use his influence to scare Hamas into releasing the 101 hostages still held in Gaza. He says there will be “hell to pay”, if the hostages are not released by the time he takes office. Another hostage has been confirmed dead (since October 7th) in recent days.
Moshe Ya’alon , the former defence minister, has joined together with Israel’s enemies saying Israel is carrying out ethnic cleaning in Gaza. It is probably the only way he can get his words printed and it is a terrible act of treason to make such claims, which have already been proven as false, along with the claims of genocide and famine .
Meanwhile, the world is quiet while the Russians and the Syrian warplanes are bombing Idlib without any warning to civilians. The Israelis are the only airforce that operates the “knock on the door’, giving civilians a warning to evacuate the area before there is an attack .
The Lebanese have started to return home to their villages in the South, and it is reported that the Hezbollah are fleeing Lebanon in buses . The Israeli displaced are less sure that the ceasefire will hold and their return is much slower, so thousands of Israeli citizens still remain displaced .
Israel has lost over 800 soldiers. Heroes everyone, as without their sacrifice we would never have worn the enemy down to this stage where they accepted a ceasefire. Even Hamas are now showing interest in a ceasefire.
The problem in Gaza is firstly that the hostages must be returned , both the dead and the living. Secondly, there is still no vision for the day after the IDF eventually pull out of Gaza. Hamas still function and are still popular. They hijack the incoming aid and resell it so are self-financing; and not one Gazan has come forward with information leading to the hostage’s release, despite huge rewards offered, as they are still supporting Hamas. There is no plan in place yet for a different education system to replace the anti semitic education, that depicted Jews as monkeys and apes, that the children had received for the past 17 years. There is no suggested alternative yet to UNWRA, who provided social services whilst managing to aid and abet Hamas.
Egypt objects to the IDF having a presence on the Gaza side of the Rafah border and the Philadelphi corridor, but they have not offered to take and administer the area. The Egyptians allowed Hamas to smuggle weapons through tunnels to those areas , but perhaps now they understand how damaging it is to allow extremist terrorist groups to build such a stockpile of weapons . Maybe, they quietly hoped that Hamas would defeat Israel, but now they know differently, they may rethink allowing the area to be used as a military powerhouse again.
In truth Gaza is now one big mess and it’s in Israel’s hands like a grenade. If we let it go, it will blow up in our faces and we cannot function holding onto to it. So we need a pan-Arab force to be prepared to step in and sort the place and the people out. It doesn’t need to be democratic as the Arab world doesn’t function well under democracy, ( they don’t function too well under their dictatorships). Peace and dignity is the best we can hope for in the short term and perhaps in a generation or two, the people will be settled enough to self determine, once they have accepted they cannot undo the 1948 War of Independence and that they will never destroy the state of Israel but must learn how to live side by side in peace and harmony.
It was reported from Hamas’ representative in Lebanon that they have reached an agreement with the Fatah to manage Gaza. We must remember that both groups support terror and cast our minds back to the last time that Fatah was governing Gaza and the Hamas takeover.
Jordan and Egypt have accepted the reality of the existence of Israel thus increasing their prosperity, and while it is a cold peace with both countries, there is no acceptable alternative. We help them and they help us even if it is begrudgingly.
The Houthi in Yemen and the Iraqi militia, continue to send occasional missiles which the airforce usually manages to intercept before they reach Israeli airspace.
Israeli society is still split into opposing camps and this is weakening the country in the eyes of the enemy. The trial of the Prime Minister is about to get underway and half the country want to see the back of him, but probably if there was an election he would gain the largest proportion of votes. There is much volatility in Judea and Samaria so there are not only enemies on the border but inside the West Bank where Arab villages and Jewish areas sit side by side.
Wizz Air have announced they will be flying to Tel Aviv once again and Haifa Air have already commenced flights to Larnaca. Hopefully, if the peace holds, other airlines will follow suit.
This war has revealed so many hidden dangers. In Israel we are now much more safe than we had been for the past 17 years. We didn’t understand the danger that was facing the country until October 7th. Israel has shown the world they will not be intimidated and despite the dark days and the terrible losses the country will once again be prosperous and bring light to the world.
In the UK, we knew there was a certain amount of antisemitism but we had no idea of the depth of hatred against Jews. Since the war the haters have flooded the streets and the police have mostly stood by allowing intimidation on the streets of London and other cities .
We are no longer in the dark and must act accordingly, knowing in the West we live in a hostile environment . However, it is not the 1930’s as we have a country with the bravest soldiers who have shown they will defend the people. In the words of Israel’s national anthem HaTikva. We at last have HOPE again.
Kind Regards
Carolyne Davis