Top US official warns Israel of 'catastrophic consequences' to war in Lebanon
A full-blown war between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon could have “catastrophic and unforeseen consequences,” a senior U.S. official has said at the Middle East America Dialogue (MEAD) summit in Washington.
“There is an idea of ‘Let’s go to war and then we will destroy all the missiles Hezbollah has and everything will be fine.’ It’s not that simple. There is no magic solution. The other side cannot be annihilated. At the end of the war, Israel may pay a heavy price and not achieve its goals,” the official was quoted by Israeli journalist Barak Ravid as saying, while recommending a diplomatic rather than military solution to calm the border tensions.
“There is no war in lab conditions. It’s not a game. I don’t doubt the capabilities of the IDF (Israeli army), but we have to think about the fact that there will be serious consequences for both sides,” the U.S. official added, speaking on the second day of the two-day Washington conference chaired by two former senior U.S. administration officials, Dennis Ross and Elliot Abrams, and two former American ambassadors to Israel, Tom Nides and David Friedman.
The official argued that if a war were to break out, the international community would intervene to reach a diplomatic solution that would be similar to what can be clinched now.
In quotes from the conference published by Hebrew media sites, the U.S. official warned that thousands, or even tens of thousands, of people could be killed if the tensions escalated into an all-out war, along with heavy damage to both Israeli and Lebanese infrastructure.
Speaking Sunday at the same conference, former Israeli war cabinet minister Benny Gantz said Israel should shift its focus away from Gaza toward the Lebanese border, declaring that “we are late on this,” while also warning that a war with the Iran-backed group is imminent if Israel does not soon strike a hostage-ceasefire deal with Hamas.
While Gantz and other Israeli officials say that a major military operation against Hezbollah is the only way to allow the tens of thousands of Israelis who have been evacuated from their homes on the northern border since October to return safely, the U.S. official warned that many civilians could be killed in the fighting and would not have homes to return to, according to the Israeli journalist Ravid.
However, according to quotes published by the Israel Hayom daily, the official also supported Israel’s position that it can no longer tolerate Hezbollah’s presence along its border following the attacks perpetrated by Hamas on October 7.
Source: Naharnet
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