Israel strikes Hezbollah, waits to strike back at Iran

The Israel Defense Forces on Thursday claimed credit for killing three Hezbollah leaders. Israeli precision strikes earlier in the day killed two Hezbollah commanders who Israel alleged were each responsible for hundreds of missile attacks against Israel. Just hours earlier, the Israeli military said it killed the commander of Hezbollah’s Syrian wing, which it called the Golan Terrorist Network. He was responsible for intelligence-gathering activities that supported Hezbollah attacks on Israel’s Golan Heights region.

Has Hezbollah confirmed these deaths? An English-language social media channel linked to Hezbollah did not confirm the leaders’ deaths on Thursday. Posts on the channel did claim credit for missile strikes against Israeli targets. Other posts shared footage depicting the apparent damage caused by those strikes.

Has Israel said anything lately about how it will respond to Iran? Israel’s Minister of Defense Yoav Gallant on Wednesday promised that when Israel responded to Iran’s recent missile attack, it would do so with the element of surprise. He promised the attack would be both precise and lethal. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday characterized Israel’s fight against Iran as a fight on behalf of all of modern civilization. But he did not provide further details on what Israel’s response would be.

The White House also said little about Israel’s possible response to the attack. U.S. President Joe Biden spoke with Netanyahu for roughly half an hour on Wednesday. But White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre and a written summary of the conversation gave very little detail on the conversation. The leaders were continuing their discussions after Iran’s attack, Jean-Pierre said. The written summary merely noted that Biden condemned Iran’s attack and supported Israel’s right to defend itself. Jean-Pierre said the call was just one out of more than a dozen between the leaders in the past year.

Dig deeper: Read my report in The Sift from yesterday about Biden and Netanyahu’s conversation.