Smotrich urges Israel to annex southern Lebanon as assault intensifies

Israel’s far-right finance minister says Litani River must be ‘the new Israeli border’, as attacks on Lebanon ramp up.

Israel’s far-right minister of finance, Bezalel Smotrich, has urged his country to annex southern Lebanon, as the military has destroyed bridges and homes in an intensified assault on the area.

In an Israeli radio interview on Monday, Smotrich said that the bombardment of Lebanon “needs to end with a different reality entirely”, which includes a “change of Israel’s borders”.

“I say here definitively … in every room and in every discussion, too: The new Israeli border must be the Litani,” he said, referring to the Litani River, a critical waterway that cuts through southern Lebanon, about 30km (19 miles) from the border with Israel.

Smotrich’s comments come as Israel continues to carry out deadly attacks on Lebanon, striking residential buildings and other civilian infrastructure, which the United Nations has said may amount to war crimes.

Intensified Israeli attacks began in early March after Hezbollah launched rockets towards Israeli territory following the start of the US and Israel’s war on Iran on February 28.

In addition to air strikes, the Israeli military has pushed deeper into Lebanese territory as part of a ground invasion that Israel says aims to root out Hezbollah fighters.

The Lebanese armed group has continued to fire into northern Israel while clashing with Israeli troops on the ground in Lebanon.

The United Nations and humanitarian groups say the conflict is having dire consequences on Lebanese civilians, with more than 1.2 million people forced out of their homes amid the violence.

Israeli attacks have killed at least 1,039 people, including 118 children, across Lebanon since early March, according to the Lebanese Ministry of Health, while 2,876 others have been wounded.

Lebanese officials have raised concerns that Israel’s recent attacks on bridges linking the south of the country to the capital, Beirut, and other areas suggest the Israeli military is preparing for intensified ground operations.

Reporting from southern Lebanon, Al Jazeera’s Zeina Khodr said Israel appears to be trying to isolate the region from the rest of the country.

“The Israeli military has been destroying infrastructure across southern Lebanon,” including fuel stations, bridges and health centres, said Khodr. “It seems to be part of a strategy to depopulate the whole southern region.”

More than 1.2 million displaced: UN

A spokesman for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told reporters on Monday that the conflict has pushed more than 1.2 million people to flee their homes.

That amounts to about one in five people across Lebanon, Stephane Dujarric said during a news briefing at UN headquarters in New York.

“More than 130,000 people, including some 46,000 children, are currently sheltering in more than 600 collective sites nationwide, most of which are already at full capacity,” Dujarric said.

Over the past few weeks, the Israeli military has issued a series of forced displacement orders for all of southern Lebanon as well as the southern suburbs of Beirut, prompting hundreds of thousands of families to flee under threat of attack.

Dujarric also said the UN remains concerned about continued attacks on Lebanese health workers.

The World Health Organization has recorded at least 64 attacks on healthcare facilities, resulting in 51 deaths and 91 injuries, he said.

Last week, Amnesty International also urged Israel to halt its attacks on Lebanese healthcare workers, stressing that they are “specifically protected under international law”.