In a detailed and comprehensive analysis of the situation in West Asia after the killing of Hassan Nasrallah and some seven other Hezbollah top commanders by the Israelis, one of India’s former ambassadors to Israel & USA and a former High Commissioner to UK has said this is “a major major victory for Israel” adding that now it seems “tactically Israel has the upper hand and, you could say, Netanyahu has the upper hand too”.
However, Navtej Sarna added that although Hezbollah may seem to be on its knees you cannot write it off and it has the capacity to regroup and still pose a major challenge to Israel.
In a 30-minute interview to Karan Thapar for The Wire, Navtej Sarna argued that the war in Gaza is not over and Israel will now find itself fighting simultaneously on two fronts, against Hezbollah in the north and against Hamas in the south.
In this interview, Sarna speaks in detail about the situation facing Hezbollah after the dramatic killing of its Secretary General, the situation in Gaza, the extent to which Israel and Netanyahu have the upper hand, the response from Iran, the USA and Arab countries like Saudi Arabia, UAE and Jordan as well as the moral cost Israel will have to bear for the “colossal civilian damage … and disregard for humanitarian laws”.
Sarna raises the question can the killing of over a 1,000 innocent Lebanese civilians and nearly 42,000 Palestinian people in Gaza be excused or overlooked on the grounds that Hezbollah has been decapitated and Hamas has been very substantially diminished and weakened?
He says 10 years from now, when the war is forgotten, these questions will continue to frame the way history is written.
