Speaker 1: From The Australian. Here's what's on the front. I'm christinamio.
Speaker 1: It's Monday, September thirty. A hung parliament is looking more
Speaker 1: likely at the next election as Labour's approval rating slides
Speaker 1: in key states. New data from Newspoll shows the coalition
Speaker 1: is also struggling to drum up support. You can read
Speaker 1: our experts state by state analysis of those new numbers
Speaker 1: right now at the Australian dot com dot au. Queensland's
Speaker 1: courts will narrow the scope of DNA testing in an
Speaker 1: attempt to clear a backlog of rape and murder cases.
Speaker 1: More than one hundred major crime cases are languishing in
Speaker 1: the forensic testing queue as the state run lab struggles
Speaker 1: to retest samples from the more than forty thousand cases
Speaker 1: caught up in the nation's biggest ever DNA disaster. The
Speaker 1: Middle East is tittering on a knife's edge after Hesbal
Speaker 1: alider Hassan Nasrallah was killed by a targeted Israeli airstrike
Speaker 1: on Saturday. Now the world is waiting to see if
Speaker 1: Hesbela's powerful backup Iran will retaliate. That's today's episode. For
Speaker 1: days Now, cities and towns across Lebanon have been rocked
Speaker 1: by explosions for days. Protesters in nearby Iran and Dyemen
Speaker 1: have rallied against the deadly Israeli air strikes, and now
Speaker 1: for three days from today, the streets will quiet, Flags
Speaker 1: around Lebanon will fly at half mast, and public buildings
Speaker 1: will close. On Monday morning, an official nationwide morning period
Speaker 1: will begin. Following the death of one of Lebanon's fiery
Speaker 1: and long standing political leaders.
Speaker 2: HESBLA has confirmed its leader, hazard Nazrula, is dead. The
Speaker 2: Israeli Defense Force says it targeted at the nerve center
Speaker 2: of HESBLA headquarters in Beirut in a fresh wave of strikes.
Speaker 1: Her son, Nozrala, was thirty two years old when he
Speaker 1: became Hesbeala's secretary General. He was appointed after his predecessor,
Speaker 1: Abbas al Maasawi was killed by Israeli forces in nineteen
Speaker 1: ninety two. In the subsequent three decades, Nzralla transformed the
Speaker 1: Shia Muslim group from a guerrilla militia to a political
Speaker 1: force known as the Party of God.
Speaker 3: Akadmamulf Halayin was.
Speaker 1: His singular focus was on the eradication of Israel and
Speaker 1: the United States from Lebanon, and his career has been
Speaker 1: defined by conflict with his nation's southern neighbour. He's credited
Speaker 1: with ending eighteen years of Israeli occupation in southern Lebanon
Speaker 1: and was declared the winner of a thirty four day
Speaker 1: war with Israel in two thousand and six, despite the
Speaker 1: extensive damage inflicted upon Lebanese forces and infrastructure, and Hesbela
Speaker 1: has sporadically joined the assault on Israel following a deadly
Speaker 1: invasion by Hamas on October seven, launching thousands of missiles
Speaker 1: across the border in a show of solidarity with the
Speaker 1: terrorist group. A charismatic leader and a shrewd strategist, Nozrella
Speaker 1: spent his final years as a recluse, broadcasting speeches and
Speaker 1: public addresses from secret locations out of fear he would
Speaker 1: be assassinated if he appeared in public. In his final
Speaker 1: broadcast on September nineteen, Nozrella condemned Israel's attack on pages
Speaker 1: and walkie talkies used by Hesbela fighters and vowed retaliation.
Speaker 3: Mahamakan Wa La Kumana, the Al Kabila and Masa Lampustna
Speaker 3: Vale and Charlah helptl Aadu, the Jeshladum al ador.
Speaker 4: I think this is an important victory for Israel. The
Speaker 4: sophistication and effectiveness of Israel's entire operation over this period
Speaker 4: has been extraordinary.
Speaker 1: Greg Sheridan is the Australians Foreign Editor.
Speaker 4: They virtually destroyed the entirety of Hesbela's leadership, and it
Speaker 4: restores the mystique of Israeli power throughout the region, the
Speaker 4: sense that Israeli intelligence is unfathomable and unstoppable. And it
Speaker 4: doesn't mean the end of Hezbollah, but it's a tremendous
Speaker 4: blow to Hesbelah and a tremendous victory for Israel.
Speaker 1: And what's the significance of this moment in the conflict
Speaker 1: in the Middle East? Is this a start of something bigger.
Speaker 5: Israel has a lot.
Speaker 4: Of strategic objectives in what it's doing at the moment.
Speaker 4: It's operating on many levels at once, but one of
Speaker 4: its objectives is to destroy the so called ring of
Speaker 4: fire that Iran has created around it with its many
Speaker 4: proxy horses. Iran has Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Magaza.
Speaker 4: Strip Israel has destroyed Hamas as a military force, and
Speaker 4: it is tremendously degrading Hezbolah. That not only makes Israel
Speaker 4: more secure, but it reduces Iran's strategic power. So these
Speaker 4: are very big changes in the regional power equations. They
Speaker 4: don't settle things for ever more, nothing ever does in
Speaker 4: the Middle East, but they're big changes in themselves.
Speaker 1: Iran has backed Hesbela from the get go, training soldiers
Speaker 1: and funneling billions of dollars of funding to Lebanon. In
Speaker 1: a statement released by the Israeli Defense Force, Prime Minister
Speaker 1: Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel had settled the score with Hesbelah,
Speaker 1: and he issued a warning to Iran, saying nowhere was
Speaker 1: beyond the IDF's reach. The question now is if and
Speaker 1: how Iran retaliates for the death of one of its
Speaker 1: closest allies.
Speaker 4: I don't expect Iran to do all that much, to
Speaker 4: be honest, for a couple of reasons. First of all,
Speaker 4: Iran has always been happy to fight to the last Palestinian,
Speaker 4: the last Lebanese, and the last Arab in its battles
Speaker 4: against Israel. It doesn't like fighting itself. And because really
Speaker 4: of the weakness of Joe Biden's administration in Washington, Iran
Speaker 4: has been able to deploy all these proxies in really
Speaker 4: violent actions, and Iran hasn't paid any penalty at all. Now,
Speaker 4: if Iran takes military action against Israel, it's hard to
Speaker 4: know what that action would be, but the consequences for
Speaker 4: Iran would be horrendous. I mean, Israel is re establishing
Speaker 4: the credibility of its deterrance. Here. De terrance stops war.
Speaker 4: If you want peace, prepared for war, and if you
Speaker 4: are very well armed, people leave you alone. But for
Speaker 4: de terrance to work, it has to live actively in
Speaker 4: the minds of your enemies. And I think if Iran
Speaker 4: attacks Israel right now, three things are likely. First, Israel
Speaker 4: will strike Iran, and it will do so very hard. Secondly,
Speaker 4: the first thing Israel will attack will be Around's nuclear facilities,
Speaker 4: so they'll be destroyed in a minute. And then thirdly,
Speaker 4: it's very likely that the Americans would get involved, and
Speaker 4: this can work in a lot of different ways. The
Speaker 4: Americans certainly won't put boots on the ground to help
Speaker 4: the Israeli there's no chance of that, but they will
Speaker 4: help them in intercepting missiles that might come from Iran,
Speaker 4: and they may very well help them with direct strikes
Speaker 4: on Iran, and if push comes to shove, Biden will
Speaker 4: apply force. So put all that together, and there are
Speaker 4: a lot of arguments for Iran being pretty judicious and
Speaker 4: cautious here blood curdling rhetoric. Anything can happen, but I'd
Speaker 4: be surprised if Iran initiated a major war anytime soon.
Speaker 1: Coming up, what's Israel's next move? Subscribe us to the Australian.
Speaker 1: Get access to this kind of detailed analysis around the clock.
Speaker 1: Check us out at the Australian dot com and we'll
Speaker 1: be back after the break.
Speaker 5: As long as Kizballah chooses the path of war, Israel
Speaker 5: has no choice, and Israel has every right to remove
Speaker 5: this threat and return our citizens to their home safely.
Speaker 5: And that's exactly what we're doing.
Speaker 1: This is Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. He's speaking at
Speaker 1: a meeting of the United Nations General Assembly on Friday.
Speaker 5: Ladies and gentlemen, Israel has made its choice. We seek
Speaker 5: to move forward to a bright age of prosperity and peace.
Speaker 5: Iran and its proxies have also made their choice. They
Speaker 5: want to move back to a dark age of terror
Speaker 5: and war. And now I have a question, and I
Speaker 5: pose that question to you, what choice will you make?
Speaker 1: A day earlier, Netanyah who rejected a twenty one day
Speaker 1: cease fire deal proposed by France and the United States
Speaker 1: designed to prevent the Middle Eastern conflict from spiraling into
Speaker 1: an all out war, and within hours of that historic speech,
Speaker 1: he ordered the massive strike on Hesbeala's headquarters that killed
Speaker 1: Hassan Nazraalah. US President Joe Biden said Nasralla's death is
Speaker 1: a measure of justice for his many civilian victims, and
Speaker 1: said ultimately he hopes the conflict can be de escalated
Speaker 1: through diplomatic endeavors. Biden's staunch support of Israel may explain
Speaker 1: the timing of Israel's assault on Lebanon. Here's Greg Sheridan.
Speaker 4: Yes, so Biden is a mixed grill. Of course, Biden
Speaker 4: is a lifelong friend of Israel, and he's an old
Speaker 4: style democrat. I think he's a dithering, pretty hopeless president,
Speaker 4: but he lets the American system operate, and his instincts
Speaker 4: solidarity with American allies, of which Israel called is a
Speaker 4: top usli and also solidarity for Israel, solidarity for the
Speaker 4: only democracy in the Middle East. Kamala Harris has none
Speaker 4: of that. She has none of Joe Biden's pro Israel
Speaker 4: outlook in her foreign policy makeup, in so far as
Speaker 4: she has any foreign policy views. Now, I think Israel
Speaker 4: is thinking in part that it wants to restructure the
Speaker 4: security environment around it. It wants to get rid of
Speaker 4: Iran's ring of fire, and it wants to change the
Speaker 4: equation for Iran in terms of cost benefit for any
Speaker 4: future conflict with Israel. And I'm sure it wants to
Speaker 4: do all that while Biden is still president. But if
Speaker 4: it gets this all done while Biden is president, Harris
Speaker 4: has to support. She certainly cannot contradict Biden on a
Speaker 4: matter like this a minute before the election. So I
Speaker 4: think the Israelis would be happy to get all this
Speaker 4: done while Harris is still under Biden's discipline, and in
Speaker 4: the context of a very tight election campaign.
Speaker 1: Israel is now fighting a war on two fronts, up
Speaker 1: north in Lebanon and down south in Gaza, and to date,
Speaker 1: ceasefire deals in either conflict have evaded negotiators. So are
Speaker 1: we getting any closer?
Speaker 4: A lot of this ceasefire talk is blooney. Really, If
Speaker 4: Hummas had any concern for the suffering of the Palestinian people.
Speaker 4: It could have had a ceasefire any day at light
Speaker 4: over the last twelve months just by releasing the hostages,
Speaker 4: and Israel, under American guidance, offered pretty generous cease fires
Speaker 4: all the way through, so who knows how many hostages
Speaker 4: are left alive. With Hezbola, you can't talk about a
Speaker 4: ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon because the Lebanese government has
Speaker 4: no control, hardly has any influence over what Hezbola does.
Speaker 4: So Hezbolah would have to commit to not firing any
Speaker 4: more rockets at Israel again ever, or at least for
Speaker 4: a long time. And since October seven, Hesbela has fired
Speaker 4: about nine thousand rocketshones and other projectiles at Israel. So
Speaker 4: Israel is not going to embark on an action of
Speaker 4: this magnitude and then stop after five minutes unless there's
Speaker 4: a very comprehensive agreement from Hesbelo. It's not a ceasepire
Speaker 4: between two chess players and you're just asking them to
Speaker 4: accept an honorable draw here or Somethingsbelar is fired by
Speaker 4: a religious and cataclysmic ideology of hatred of Jews and
Speaker 4: hatred of Israel and hatred of the West, and until
Speaker 4: you get very big assurance and very credible assurance from
Speaker 4: Hesbelas that it's finished with the attacks on Israel. That's
Speaker 4: not to say Israel will go on forever, but Israel
Speaker 4: will keep going until it feels it's achieved its military objectives.
Speaker 1: Greg Sheridan is the Australians Foreign Editor. This story is
Speaker 1: developing quickly. For all our latest reporting and analysis, go
Speaker 1: to the Australian dot com.
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