Or, after the business of the exploding pagers and the continuing targeted bombings, is he hoping to continue humiliating hezbollah and showing it up as powerless? but suppose hezbollah hangs on and keeps firing missiles at israel, to the point where mr netanyahu feels he s got to take that extra step of putting israeli boots on lebanese soil? i spoke to nafiseh kohnavad, a middle east correspondent of bbc world service, at her flat in beirut. Nafiseh originally worked as a journalist in iran, but was forced to leave after asking too many hard questions of iran s political leaders. At the moment that i m talking to you, israeli air strikes have intensified significantly. For the first time, when hassan nasrallah, the leader of hezbollah, was giving a speech, he clearly mentioned that now this is a new phase, and that the group was expecting that israeli forces may enter southern lebanon by land. Before that, erm, all words were around that both sides don t want all out war. Now, you re
Must be avoided. Died aged 88. Must be avoided. He said he plans to speak the operation directed by israel s defence minister. Translation: we have no i interest in expanding the war. We have no interest in looking for additionalfronts. But if somebody attacks israel, as the houthis have recently done, with missiles and throughout the war with cruise missiles and drones, anyone who carries out such an attack, we will settle the account with them, and we know how to do it. Israel is not holding back, its air force releasing footage as they set off for the raid. And earlier today, it says it shot down another drone launched from yemen. For the past year, the yemeni houthis have been trying to influence the conflict in the middle east. This is their commandos seizing a british owned ship in the red sea last november. They have long range missiles, are supported by iran and are fiercely opposed to israel. Speaking yesterday, the houthis military spokesperson yahya saree said they wouldn t