Israel vows to occupy large parts of southern Lebanon to expand buffer zone

[muriel_volestrangler]

Source: The Guardian

Plans would prevent the return of hundreds of thousands of residents

Israel said on Tuesday that it will occupy wide swathes of south Lebanon and destroy the homes along the border to prevent the return of some 600,000 residents, prompting concerns of long-term forced displacement.

Israel’s defence minister, Israel Katz, said that it will occupy the area under the Litani River, some 19 miles from the Israel-Lebanon border, as part of its so-called buffer zone inside southern Lebanon when fighting with Hezbollah ends.

“At the end of the operation, the IDF would control the area up to the Litani River, including the remaining Litani bridges, while eliminating Radwan forces that infiltrated the area and destroying all weapons there,” Katz said, referring to the elite unit of the pro-Iran Hezbollah group.

He added that all homes near the villages would be destroyed “in accordance with the Rafah and Beit Hanoun model in Gaza.” The Israeli military razed most homes and public infrastructure in both neighbourhoods of Gaza, reducing them to rubble.

Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/mar/31/israel-vows-occupy-large-parts-southern-lebanon-expand-buffer-zone

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So that's 600,000 permanent refugees, impoverished by the State of Israel. Not for doing anything, just living where they did.

[patphil]

1. It won't be long before Israeli citizens start to move in, and that area becomes a de facto part of Israel.

That's the same thing that's going to happen in Gaza, as soon as the ethnic cleansing is complete.

[Botany]

2. I hope those Israeli soldiers and the new Jewish residents who will undoubtedly move into that area ..

… after it has been secured get wiped out. The creation if the State of Israel resulted in the destruction
of the Homeland of the Palestinian People and Israel hasn’t done one thing to make it right to those
Palestinians. This is insanity.

[Prairie Gates]

3. Israel illegally annexes more Lebensraum as part of its aggressive territorial expansion

It's quickly becoming clear that one of the main goals of the Iran war was expansion of the Israeli borders to the Litani River. The US was tricked into war by Netanyahu for what is essentially just the Israeli invasion and annexation of southern Lebanon.

[moniss]

9. I remember catching flak over the last two years when

I said this was the aim and goal all along to go to the Litani River.

[AloeVera]

4. Gaza Part II and now Nakba Part III.

Who will stop Israel?

What's with a nation obsessed with burning villages and terrorizing the natives in order to steal their land? So they can re-create some biblical kingdom and prophesy?

That's not civilization or a modern state. Israel needs to join civilized modernity or shut the fuck up about a "right to exist". No one has the right to exist over the lands and bodies of its natives and neighbours.

[Intractable]

5. "all homes near the villages would be destroyed" - war crimes

[democratsruletheday]

6. TRUST me when I say that Netenyahoo and his fuckhead gov't

have bitten off more than they can chew. NO way they can handle and govern the region(s) they're illegally pilfering. No way, no how folks. They will crash and burn and it might take a little while but there's NO damn way on god's green earth they'll get away with this in the long run. Especially when Dems win the mid terms in Nov. and the white house in '28. They they'll be on their own again. Bibi is such a loon. Again, it won't last and it won't work. They're just further de-stabilizing the region for generations to come.

[maxsolomon]

7. This is a massive area. The Litani flows into the Mediterranean NORTH of Tyre.

Basically draw a line west from the North tip of Israel - that's the Litani.

It's likely this was Israel's actual goal for Trump's war.

Displacing 600K people from an area that has been occupied for 8,000 years. War crimes.

[bluestarone]

8. Two EVIL countries.