THE ISRAELI military yesterday launched a large-scale exercise, involving ground forces, naval vessels and aircraft, simulating a war against Lebanon’s Hezbollah resistance movement.
The multi-day manoeuvres, dubbed ‘Deadly Arrow,’ began in the occupied territories on Sunday.
Although the largest planned for this year, the war games were significantly scaled back due to restrictions imposed over the coronavirus pandemic.
The Israeli military said the drills would simulate a ‘multi-front scenario focused on the northern arena’ and will predominantly focus on how various headquarters and command centres work together and communicate in wartime.
‘The goal of the exercise is improving the army’s attack ability and testing all levels of the military in an integrated way,’ it said in a statement.
‘Headquarters, conscripted troops, and reservist forces are taking part in the exercise alongside the air force, navy, and ground forces, as well as the intelligence, technology and logistics, teleprocessing, and cyber defence directorates.’
Meanwhile, Hamas in Gaza said in a statement yesterday: ‘As some Arab regimes have rushed to announce normalisation agreements with the Israeli occupation, the last of them was the US-Israeli-Sudanese tripartite deal, we condemn this political deviation, which reflects the yawning gap between some rulers and the consciousness of their nations and glorious history.
‘We are confident that the Sudanese-Israeli agreement does not reflect the historical positions of Sudanese people towards the Palestinian cause.
‘We hail the voices and stances within Sudan rejecting normalisation and the latest agreement with the Israeli occupation; this confirms that striking deals with the Israeli occupation will not succeed in remapping the Arab region according to Israeli desires.
‘This map is only drawn by the peoples who are committed to their constants and our inalienable rights in Palestine and disapprove the Israeli occupation, which will have no future at the expense of our people’s rights in their homeland: Palestine.’
- Hanan Ashrawi, Member of the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), said yesterday that the murder of Amer Snoubar by Israeli occupation forces early on Sunday morning was a ‘monstrous act of brutality motivated by hate and encouraged by impunity’.
Dr Ashrawi said: ‘The vicious murder of 18-year-old Amer Snoubar at the hands of Israeli occupation forces is a monstrous act of brutality against a defenceless young man whose only crime was being Palestinian. Israeli occupation soldiers bludgeoned Amer this dawn, and medical authorities have confirmed that he was beaten repeatedly on the back of the neck then left for dead.
‘Such crimes are perpetrated and perpetuated by Israeli occupation soldiers because they are part of a regime that awards criminality and ensures impunity for crimes, domestically and internationally. The daily structural violence against Palestinians, which is the lifeline of this illegal occupation, entrenches a culture of racism, hate, and dehumanisation against the Palestinian people, allowing for such crimes to happen without shame, fear, regret, or accountability.
‘The only way for these crimes to end is for the illegal Israeli regime of occupation to end.’
