The US cannot allow Israel to turn Lebanon into a second Gaza

‘There’s little doubt that over the past week, Israel has launched an all-out war against its smaller neighbor, even if that war has not yet turned into a regional conflagration that draws in Iran and its allied militias.’ Photograph: Jordan Pettitt/PA

Just after daybreak on Monday, dozens of US-made warplanes began raining bombs and missiles on Lebanon, killing more than 550 people and injuring 1,800 in the hours that followed. By day’s end, Israel had carried out one of the most intense aerial bombardments in modern history. The Israeli fighter jets were sent by the government of Benjamin Netanyahu, but they couldn’t have gotten off the ground without the full support and complicity of Joe Biden over the past 11 months.

The Israeli military said it bombed more than 1,600 targets throughout Lebanon that day, claiming it was targeting locations where Hezbollah stored rockets and other weapons it was firing at northern Israel. The death toll, which included 50 children and 94 women, was the country’s highest single-day toll since Lebanon’s 15-year civil war ended in 1990. Nearly 500,000 Lebanese civilians fled their homes in southern Lebanon, the Bekaa valley and other regions.