A series of airstrikes and artillery attacks against a Hezbollah position located near Aita a-Shaab in Lebanon was released today. According to the report released by the IDF, Hezbollah used the area to stage equipment and fighters for attacks against Northern Israel, as a result the decision to strike the region was made. In total, they hit over 40 targets.

For those of you who read below the fold, I want to take a moment to point out one significant piece of news that is not being reported on by the mainstream media today. While it doesn't apply to the video above, it does apply to the larger macro situation in Israel, which is why I'm putting it in this post as there is no further video coming out of Israel today unless something breaking happens overnight.

For those of you who have been paying attention, you likely already know that the United States has been planning a humanitarian aid mission to Gaza. The intent of the operation is to build a pier in Gaza proper and bring humanitarian aid supplies ashore with the use of the United States Navy, and likely United States Marines. On the ground, security for the pier will be provided by the Israeli Defense Force, but the American ships and supplies will be protected and distributed by U.S. Military personnel.

Today, that pier was struck by indirect fire weapon systems by Hamas while it is still under construction. There was one injury at the pier, and American engineering equipment was also damaged during the attack. Now, I will editorialize and you are free to disagree with me. I'm not your Dad.

The intent of this Humanitarian Aid mission has not been clearly defined by the Biden Administration at this time, however I suspect, like in Afghanistan, this is an attempt to save political face by wrapping a bow around a shitty situation. Like in Kabul, we are once again needlessly putting U.S. troops in harms way so that a politician and his general officers can try to score a political win with the American people.

I suspect, as anti-Israel protests continue to intensify around the country in far-left circles who the current administration view as their base, that the Biden administration intends to televise this event across every social media and television platform that they can. Their hope is to get some feel-good stories of U.S. troops handing out boxes of candy to Palestinian children, and to get some nice photos of Americans scoring a win under the Biden administration's tenure as POTUS.

There are several likely courses of action for Hamas, the PIJ, Hezbollah, and Iran though. First, Hamas intends to hammer the ever living shit out of this operation as soon as the humanitarian aid starts to flow. Second, Hezbollah, backed by Iran, will turn whatever ship is in port getting the supplies offloaded into another U.S.S. Cole incident for the current administration to deal with. Third, the PIJ convinces some psychopath in civilian clothing to detonate himself on the pier creating a new Abbey Gate scenario for us to deal with. Last but not least, fourth, America gets it's first taste of drone dropped grenades over the top of a naval vessel.

While humanitarian aid operations into denied areas are a key function of the United States Marines and United States Navy, there is almost no scenario in which this doesn't turn into a kinetic event for the troops who get tasked with this job. Better options exist, however neither ground transporting the supplies into Gaza through Israel (which Israel has said they would allow) or utilizing more air-dropped humanitarian aid paint the same picture of American might as using a Naval vessel, and neither would present a political win for the current administration in the middle of a hotly contested election year.

For the five of you who read below the fold, thanks. Sorry for any typos, I own them. This is a blog, I have no editor. Everything after the bold line is my opinion and assessment of the situation. I will be happy to be proven wrong.