Israel’s focus shifting to ‘northern front’ with Lebanon: ambassador

Ambassador of Israel to Canada Iddo Moed says that Israel is counting on its Western allies to do their part as it takes the fight to Iran-backed Hezbollah militants on its northern border with Lebanon.

“The international community should do its utmost to find a diplomatic solution … to this problem,” Moed told National Post Ottawa bureau correspondent Rahim Mohamed in an interview on Friday.

“We don’t want war, and I don’t think the inhabitants of Lebanon want war.”

Moed said he hopes the international community will exert pressure on both Lebanon and Iran to flush Hezbollah out of the Israel-Lebanon border area, citing UN Security Council Resolution 1701, which established a buffer zone there.

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He also said he is sympathetic to Ottawa’s concerns about the tens of thousands of Canadians currently living in Lebanon, noting that Israel has set a goal of making sure that the inhabitants of the “northern area” can return safely to their homes.

The ambassador’s comments come at a time when Israel is shifting its military focus from Gaza to the northern front with Lebanon. Thousands of injuries were reported earlier this week when rigged pagers and walkie-talkies used by Hezbollah terrorists exploded simultaneously in parts of Lebanon and Syria.

Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah vowed revenge on Thursday for the electonics attack, which Israel has yet to claim responsibility for.

Moed, who was virtually brand new to the job when the October 7 attacks broke out in southern Israel, says the 350 days since the attacks have been “incredibly difficult” for him and the rest of the embassy’s staff. He added that he’s been especially dismayed to see keffiyehs and Palestinian flags being used as political props in Canada.

“All of a sudden carrying a Palestinian flag means ‘no Israel’,” Moed remarked, adding that anti-Israel chants like “from the river to the sea” aren’t commonplace in the Middle East itself.

Moed said that he’d like to see policymakers in Canada and elsewhere do more to block the anti-Israel and antisemitic content being fed to young people on social media platforms like the Chinese-owned TikTok.

“(Experts) say if you just flip through TikTok, within a few minutes you can become antisemitic…. More needs to be done about that.”

Watch the full interview in the video above.

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