Recent (past few days) events in the Levant

Factual Questions
1

Would someone mind summarizing the recent events in Israel/Lebanon? Somehow I missed the buildup and now all the news coverage is unhelpfully about panicked Americans evacuating Beirut with little explanation. I’m feeling a bit out of the loop. As I understand it, Israel executed another violent strike ostensibly against terrorists, but this seems fairly common; why did this particular exchange get so escalated so fast?

2

Oh, and this is in GQ and not GD because I’m not interested in overarching sociopolitical themes here; I’m for the most part familiar with those. I’m looking for a descriptive sequence of events based on happenings rather than on conjecture and theorizing.

3

Simple. Terrorists from Lebanon went into Israel, killed a bunch of soldiers, and kidnapped 2 of them, bringing them back into Lebanon. The Israelis are retaliating and trying to simultaneously prevent more weapons from coming into Lebanon, and shut down the infrastructure to make it harder to smuggle the kidnapped soldiers out to, say, Syria or Iran.

4

Wikipedia has a timeline that might help.

5

Thanks, that Wikipedia timeline is perfect.

6

It should be noted that the US, Russia & the EU cut all funds & support to the Palestinian Authority when HAMAS became the majority ruling party. HAMAS refused to renounce terrorism, & the money went bye-bye. HAMAS likely pulled this stunt to mask the fact that the Palestinian Authority is going to hell in a handbasket under their rule, & bankrupt too boot.

By switching the focus of the Palestinians back to Israel, & provoking military conflict, they ensure that extremism, not compromise or good government, is the agenda.

They are pulling this in a cynical move to keep control.

7

Actually, the Israeli soldiers were on the Lebanese side of the border when they were ambushed and captured.

8

My mistake. I can only find the cite that the capture occurred on the Israeli side in one article. It looks as though that author conflated the capture with the subsequent ambush on the Lebanese side when the Israelis pursued the guerillas.