“There is nowhere in the Middle East Israel cannot reach. There is nowhere we will not go to protect our people and protect our country,” Netanyahu warned in a Monday video statement addressed to Iranian civilians. “When Iran is finally free, and that moment will come a lot sooner than people think — everything will be different.”

The people of Iran should know – Israel stands with you pic.twitter.com/MfwfNqnTgE

— Benjamin Netanyahu – בנימין נתניהו (@netanyahu) September 30, 2024

His video remarks come as Israeli forces prepare for a possible ground invasion in southern Lebanon as they continue their assault against Hezbollah forces. Israeli officials told their U.S. counterparts that the operations “are limited operations focused on Hezbollah infrastructure near the border,” according to U.S. State Department spokesman Matthew Miller.

“The next phase in the war against Hezbollah will begin soon and will be a significant factor in achieving the goal of the war — returning the residents of the north to their homes,” said Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant.

The Biden administration continues to oppose any escalation in the fighting between Israel and Hezbollah. Over the last couple of weeks, Israel has significantly degraded Hezbollah’s senior leadership ranks, but Hezbollah has maintained its arsenal and ability to launch projectile attacks into Israel.

Late last week, the Israeli Air Force targeted and killed Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah and multiple other senior leaders. Nasrallah had been the leader of Hezbollah for more than three decades and was the face of Iran’s most vaunted proxies.

Iran, which has largely refrained from directly attacking Israel, could do just that to avenge Nasrallah’s death. Iran’s forces carried out a massive aerial attack on Israel back in April, but it was largely thwarted by Israel and its allies, including the United States. Iranian leaders vowed to avenge the assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, who was killed in Tehran, though Iran ultimately has not responded against Israel directly.

Both Netanyahu and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian addressed the United Nations General Assembly in New York City last week. Pezeshkian’s address, which took place prior to Nasrallah’s killing, warned that Israel’s strikes against Hezbollah “cannot go unanswered.”

Hezbollah began attacking Israel with rockets and missiles, targeting the area along the border in northern Israel in the aftermath of Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist attack. Hamas terrorists overpowered the border, killed roughly 1,200 people, and kidnapped about 250 others. Israel, fearing another cross-border raid such as the one Hamas had pulled off, evacuated more than 50,000 residents in northern Israel who remain displaced from their homes.

Israeli officials have said their goal is to force an end to Hezbollah’s continued attacks to set the conditions for those residents to return to their homes.

The two sides last went to war in 2006, when Israeli forces occupied southern Lebanon after Hezbollah carried out a deadly cross-border raid that included the kidnapping of Israeli soldiers. The war, which lasted about a month, ended with the passing of United Nations Security Resolution 1701. The resolution called for Israeli forces to leave Lebanon, which they did, and for Hezbollah to move north of the Litani River, which would effectively create a roughly 18-mile buffer zone between Hezbollah and the Israeli border.

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Hezbollah never left the area south of the Litani River, and that’s where most of Israel’s airstrikes have been concentrated.

Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Makati said Monday that his government is ready to fully implement the resolution’s specifics, and he called for a ceasefire between Hezbollah and Israel.