{"id":275789,"date":"2024-09-30T12:00:40","date_gmt":"2024-09-30T11:00:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=275789"},"modified":"2024-09-27T05:04:26","modified_gmt":"2024-09-27T04:04:26","slug":"strong-measures-needed-to-prevent-escalation-of-israel-hezbollah-armed-conflict","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2024\/09\/strong-measures-needed-to-prevent-escalation-of-israel-hezbollah-armed-conflict\/","title":{"rendered":"Strong Measures Needed to Prevent Escalation of Israel-Hezbollah Armed Conflict"},"content":{"rendered":"

26 Sep 2024 – <\/em>U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres, in his opening remarks to the U.N. General Assembly on 24 September 2024 said,<\/p>\n

“Gaza is a non-stop nightmare that threatens to take the entire region with it.\u00a0 Look no further than Lebanon. We should all be alarmed by the escalation.\u00a0 Lebanon is at the brink.\u00a0 The people of Lebanon – the people of Israel – and the people of the world – cannot afford Lebanon to become another Gaza.”<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Lebanon may have already moved over the brink.\u00a0 Israeli strikes on Lebanon on 23 September killed at least 356 people and injured more than 1, 200 others.\u00a0 Hezbollah deputy chief, Naim Qasse\u00f9 has just said “We have entered a new phase – an open-ended battle of reckoning.”<\/p>\n

A rapid escalation in recent days, starting with the attack on Hezbollah members via booby-trapped pagers and walkie-talkies followed by Israeli bombardments has raised the specter of a new phase in the conflict with a possible ground invasion by Israeli troops as in 1982 and 2006.\u00a0 There are fears that Iran could be drawn into the fighting.\u00a0 The new Iranian President, Masoud Pezeshian speaking at the U.N. General Assembly also on 24 September, demanded a global response to the Lebanon situation – “not to allow Lebanon to become another Gaza.”<\/p>\n

Hezbollah is supported by Iran but not fully under Iranian control.\u00a0 Nassan Nasrallah, the Secretary-General of Hezbollah has in recent days made widely watched television talks attacking Israeli politics and indicating continuing Hezbollah support for the Palestinians in Gaza saying that a ceasefire in Gaza was necessary before any negotiations with Hezbollah could take place.\u00a0 Since negotiations for a ceasefire in Gaza seem unlikely for the moment, Hezbollah’s current is likely to continue.\u00a0 \u00a0In addition, recent tensions in the West Bank between Israeli settlers, Israeli soldiers and Palestinians in settled villages have added more heat to the general tensions in the area.<\/p>\n

The issue is what can be done now to prevent escalation and reduce tensions.\u00a0 A first step is to stress respect for international humanitarian law. Hospitals, medical facilities, educational institutions have been destroyed in the exchanges of fire. There is a need for resolute action on the violations of humanitarian law.\u00a0 Regular military personnel of all countries are theoretically informed of the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949 and the Protocol Additional adopted in 1977 in light of the experiences of the war in Vietnam.\u00a0 Today, international human rights standards are also considered part of international humanitarian law, thus providing additional protection for vulnerable population groups such as women, children and minorities.<\/p>\n

A possible second phase is the “good offices” function of the U.N. Secretary-General.\u00a0 It is certain that the U.N. Secretariat is concerned, but their ability for action may be very limited.<\/p>\n

It is not clear what governments at the U.N. can do.\u00a0 The Security Council has been blocked on many issues by the veto.\u00a0 The resolutions of the General Assembly are “recommendations ” with little follow up in practice.<\/p>\n

A 21-day ceasefire proposal has just been set out at the U.N. by France and the U.S.A.<\/p>\n

There may be some role for non-official mediation carried out by groups representing religious, academic, or charitable organizations.\u00a0 One advantage of non-official mediation is that all concerned are aware that such mediation is genuinely impartial seeking only a reduction of suffering caused by the conflicts.\u00a0 The disadvantage is that non-official mediators lack the resources, political, economic or military on which governmental mediators can draw.<\/p>\n

It is certain that strong measures are needed to prevent escalation.\u00a0Vision and creativity are important factors.\u00a0 The role of non-governmental organizations in consultative status with the U.N. may be able to play a role in these dangerous times.<\/p>\n

______________________________________<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a> Ren\u00e9 Wadlow is a member of the <\/em>TRANSCEND Network for Peace Development Environment<\/a>. He <\/em>is President of the Association of World Citizens, an international peace organization with consultative status with ECOSOC, the United Nations organ facilitating international cooperation and problem-solving in economic and social issues<\/em>, and <\/em>editor of <\/em>Transnational Perspectives.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“Gaza is a non-stop nightmare that threatens to take the entire region with it.\u00a0Look no further than Lebanon. We should all be alarmed by the escalation.\u00a0The peoples of Lebanon, of Israel, and of the world cannot afford Lebanon to become another Gaza.” — Antonio Guterres<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":244689,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[3339,88,767,124,92,481],"class_list":["post-275789","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-transcend-members","tag-hezbollah","tag-israel","tag-middle-east","tag-united-nations","tag-violent-conflict","tag-warfare"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/275789","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=275789"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/275789\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":275790,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/275789\/revisions\/275790"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/244689"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=275789"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=275789"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=275789"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}