Israel’s Netanyahu announces expanded war goals to include Lebanon border
Al Jazeera
Israeli prime minister says war aims should include enabling Israelis who fled areas near the border to return home.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said his goals for the war in Gaza have expanded to include enabling Israelis who have fled areas near the Lebanese border to return to their homes.
There has been almost daily cross-border fire between Israeli forces and the Iran-backed Lebanese armed group Hezbollah since Israel began its war on Gaza nearly a year ago.
The exchanges have forced tens of thousands of people on both sides from their homes and threatened to ignite a wider regional conflict.
The decision to include “the safe return of the residents of the north to their homes” was approved during an overnight meeting of Netanyahu’s security cabinet, his office said in a statement on Tuesday.
The decision comes a day after Israel’s Minister of Defense Yoav Gallant told a visiting United States envoy that “military action” was the “only way left to ensure the return of Israel’s northern communities”.
