Hello, you're listening to the LRB podcast, and I'm your host, Adam Shats.

This week, we've been featuring a series of conversations

about the crisis in the Middle East a year after the 7th of October. In our earlier episodes,

we explored the impact of 7 October and Israel's war in Gaza on Israelis and Palestinians.

In our third and final episode, we're shifting geographically to Lebanon,

where Benjamin Netanyahu has opened another front in an effort to destroy the Shia militant

organization, Hezbollah, the country's most powerful political group. The opening salvo was launched a month ago, when Israel

detonated explosives hidden inside of pagers and walkie-talkies owned by Hezbollah members. The attack

was followed by the assassination of much of Hezbollah's senior leadership, including its

Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah, who was killed

under a fuselade of more than 80 bombs on his compound in the south of Beirut, along with 300 others.

Shortly after, Israeli troops invaded southern Lebanon, crossing the border for the first time

since their withdrawal in 2000 after 22 years of occupation.

Netanyahu and his defense minister Joav Galant claim the invasion will be limited in scope,

but so far more than 2,000 people in Lebanon have been killed, many of them civilians,

and 1.2 million displaced, a quarter of the population.

Entire areas in southern Lebanon and the Beka Valley have been flattened.

The Israelis have fired on UN peacekeepers, and Netanyahu has warned the Lebanese government

that the country will be turned into another Gaza if Hezbollah isn't overthrown, something the Lebanese government that the country will be turned into another Gaza if Hezbollah

isn't overthrown, something the Lebanese couldn't do even if they wanted to.

The killing of Nisrala, meanwhile, has led Iran to respond by firing 180 ballistic missiles

at Israel, which in turn promises to respond with a devastating attack of its own that could happen

...