Good morning. We’re following a devastating day of Israeli air strikes in Lebanon – more on that below, along with the start to B.C.’s election campaign and Fred Lum’s 40 years of remarkable photos for The Globe and Mail. But first:
Today’s headlines
- The Crown calls on the Supreme Court to clarify liability in the suicide cases before the Kenneth Law trial
- Rwanda sent child soldiers to Congo, a UN report says, despite the country’s pledge to Canada
- Justin Trudeau tells Stephen Colbert that it’s a ‘tough time’ in Canada
Cars sit in traffic as they flee the southern villages amid ongoing Israeli airstrikes, in Sidon, Lebanon, Monday, Sept. 23, 2024.Mohammed Zaatari/The Associated Press
Middle East
Closing in on an all-out war
For nearly a year, in the wake of the Hamas-led Oct. 7 attack and Israel’s invasion of Gaza, Hezbollah and Israel have traded strikes across Lebanon’s southern border. But yesterday marked a dramatic escalation: Waves of Israeli air strikes on roughly 1,300 targets, mostly in southern and eastern Lebanon, killed more than 490 people and injured more than 1,600 others. It was the deadliest day of attacks since at least 2006, when Israel and Hezbollah last fought a war.
Are they fighting a war now? Very deliberately, no one is using that word yet – if only because, as The Globe’s foreign correspondent Mark MacKinnon has written, Lebanese and Israelis alike know how much worse this conflict could get. But over the past week, exploding pagers and walkie-talkies, Israel’s targeted killings of top Hezbollah commanders, and missiles launched deeper into Israeli territory have brought both sides to the brink. They continued to exchange fire overnight. “All-out war like we saw in 2006 seems increasingly inevitable,” MacKinnon told me yesterday.
The balance of power
Hezbollah, the Iran-backed militant group, is still reeling from Israel’s co-ordinated attacks on its communications network last week. On Tuesday, the sudden, simultaneous denotation of pagers carried by Hezbollah members killed 12 people, including two children. More than 2,800 were wounded, including Iran’s envoy to Beirut, overwhelming hospitals across the country. At least 25 people were killed and another 450 injured when walkie-talkies exploded the next day. Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah called the attacks “an unprecedented blow.”
On Friday, an Israeli air strike levelled a high-rise apartment in Dahiya, Beirut’s densely populated southern suburb, killing several senior Hezbollah commanders as well as the head of its special forces, Ibrahim Aqil. This weekend, Hezbollah fired its deepest rocket attacks into Israel since the start of the war in Gaza, with some landing just north of Haifa, while Israel continued to strike southern Lebanon from the air. It all prompted one United Nations official to warn of “imminent catastrophe.”
Yesterday, thousands of Lebanese fled the south, gridlocking the main highway out of port city Sidon with cars heading toward Beirut. It was the biggest exodus in the region since 2006. Across the border, more than 60,000 Israelis, evacuated from the north at the start of the conflict, have been unable to return because of Hezbollah’s rocket and drone strikes, which persisted yesterday. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is under mounting pressure to get them home, and told his security meeting that yesterday’s military attack was meant to change “the balance of power in the north.”
Watching the ground
It’s unclear whether this shifting balance means a ground war in Lebanon. The last time that happened, nearly two decades ago, “the Israeli invasion was pretty much fought to a standstill by Hezbollah,” MacKinnon told me. “We don’t know why Israel thinks they could eradicate Hezbollah now.” Israel hasn’t been able to drive out Hamas from a much smaller region in Gaza, and the costs of its efforts have been high: According to the Gaza health ministry, Israeli assaults have killed at least 41,000 Palestinians, displaced most of Gaza’s 2.3 million residents, and reduced much of the area to rubble. Dozens of Israeli hostages taken on Oct. 7 are still missing, Israeli authorities say.
MacKinnon will be watching for stepped-up attacks on Dahiya, the Beirut suburb: “There have been a couple of strikes there by Israeli war planes in the past few days, and that’s coming close to what we thought was Hezbollah’s red line.” Does the militia in turn begin targeting Tel Aviv or Ben Gurion – Israel’s main international airport – 20 kilometres south? “If that happens, we are very close to all-out war,” MacKinnon says. “In fact, until now, what’s been remarkable is Hezbollah’s apparent unwillingness to take Israel’s bait. But the big question is how much longer they can take this kind of pounding without full-scale retaliation.”
The Shot
‘I want to give people a chance to be seen’
Maria Noolook and her daughter Adelynn in Rankin Inlet, Nunavut.Fred Lum/The Globe and Mail
Over his 40 years (and counting) as a photojournalist at The Globe, Fred Lum has captured moments of national grief, such as the 2014 shooting at the National War Memorial in Ottawa, and moments of national triumph, including Joe Carter’s jubilant, World Series-winning home run for the Blue Jays in 1993. He documented financial crashes and China’s rising economic power; he’s photographed the sun in total eclipse and Margaret Atwood in regal profile. “You don’t want to butt heads,” he says, but still: “Sometimes you can’t take no for an answer.” Discover photos from Lum’s extraordinary career here and – because I cannot resist a fantastic portrait – one more below.
A rare-breed Lincoln Longwool sheep.Fred Lum/The Globe and Mail
The Wrap
What else we’re following
At home: BC NDP Leader David Eby and Conservative Leader John Rustad kicked off the province’s election campaign by jousting over health care spending. (Meanwhile, the NDP surfaced a video of Rustad saying he regrets getting “the so-called vaccine” against COVID-19.)
Abroad: More than 70 years after being kidnapped as a boy in California, Luis Armando Albino was found on the opposite coast thanks to an online ancestry test, old photos and newspaper clippings.
On air: The NHL and Amazon unveiled their broadcast plans for Monday (and Thursday) night hockey in Canada, including a Drive to Survive-style docuseries and a two-minute highlight reel made by AI.
In bloom: A bright pink flower called fireweed is one of the first to sprout from the ashes of a wildfire. Now a Calgary brewery has blended its honey into a lager that’ll help Jasper evacuees and reforestation.