Report: No military build-up on Lebanon border, Israel seeking 'symmetric responses'
After Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant announced that Israel’s army is shifting its attention from Gaza to the border with Lebanon, informed military sources told Lebanon’s al-Binaa newspaper that Israel has not sent any unusual reinforcements to Lebanon’s frontier.
The Israeli military leaders “are saying that focusing on the north stands for guaranteeing symmetric responses to the resistance’s strikes, without mentioning the notion of going to a grand or all-out war,” the daily added.
Diplomatic sources meanwhile told the newspaper that “Israel is working on pushing Hezbollah back by 10 kilometers from the border through intensifying military and security strikes in order to destroy the frontline villages along the border and create an additional buffer zone, in addition to the assassination of Hezbollah’s field commanders.”
“This is aimed at restoring security in the north and returning the settlers, in light of the political and popular pressures on the Israeli government to regain deterrence on the southern front” of Lebanon, the sources added.
| Copyright © 2012 Naharnet.com. All Rights Reserved. | https://naharnet.com/stories/en/307458 |