Update Feb 7th (Day 124)

UPDATES ON THE WAR – Day 124 (Feb 7^th):

*Anderson Tours has officially decided to move forward with our April Holy Land Tour with contingencies in place to cancel or postpone if deemed unsafe! So far so good!

*We are one Day 124 (Feb 7^th) STILL CLOSE TO A CEASE FIRE / HOSTAGE RELEASE!

[We have created categories to make our summaries easier to read and understand.]

Headlines:

• Secretary of State Antony Blinken is making another trip to the region this week to “continue working with our partners on how to achieve durable peace in the region, with lasting security for Israelis and Palestinians alike.” he wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter.

OUCH:

• No deal has been solidified yet, both sides are close…meanwhile fighting continues.

YEAH:

• Jake Sullivan, Mr. Biden’s national security adviser, said on Sunday (Feb 4^th) that making sure more aid reaches civilians in Gaza would be a “top priority” for Mr. Blinken on his trip, including in meetings with the Israeli government. “We want to ensure that they are getting access to lifesaving food, medicine, water, shelter, and we’ll continue to press until that is done,” he said on CBS’s “Face the Nation.”
• Anderson Tours is resuming Tours to sacred locations in the Holy Land beginning in April

IN THE SOUTH (RED SEA):

• The US Military’s Central Command says its forces shot down a drone over the Gulf of Aden yesterday (Feb 3^rd) and later conducted strikes against four Houthi UAVs that were being readied for launch. “US forces identified the UAVs in Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen and determined that they presented an imminent threat to merchant vessels and the US Navy ships in the region. US forces subsequently struck and destroyed the UAVs in self-defense,” says a tweet from CENTCOM.
• The United States launched scores of strikes across the Middle East over the weekend as Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken set out for the region to push forward negotiations to secure the release of Israelis still held hostage in Gaza and get more humanitarian aid into the battered enclave.
• The latest strike came Sunday (Feb 4^th) in Yemen, where the U.S. military said it had destroyed an anti-ship cruise missile that belonged to Houthi militants and posed “an imminent threat to U.S. Navy ships and merchant vessels in the region.” It was the third American military action against Iranian-backed militias in as many days: The United States led strikes on Saturday (Feb 3^rd) against 36 Houthi targets in northern Yemen, and on Friday (Feb 2^nd) carried out airstrikes on more than 85 targets in Syria and Iraq.
• American officials insist that the strikes have been carefully calibrated to avoid setting off an open confrontation with Iran and say that they have degraded the ability of the militias to attack U.S. forces.
• In a four-day trip, Mr. Blinken is expected to travel to Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Qatar, Israel and the West Bank. His goal is in part to “continue work to prevent the spread of the conflict,” said Matthew Miller, a State Department spokesman.
• Friday’s strikes were largely in retaliation for a drone attack by an Iranian-backed militia that killed three American soldiersin Jordan on Jan. 28. American officials insisted in the aftermath that there had been no back-channel discussion with Tehran or any sort of quiet agreement to avoid directly hitting Iran. And on Sunday they warned of more to come. “The president was clear when he ordered them and when he conducted them that that was the beginning of our response and there will be more steps to come,” Sullivan, the national security adviser, said on CNN’s “State of the Union.”
• Neither American nor Arab officials believe that the capabilities of the Houthis have been significantly degraded by the campaign, and the militants have vowed to keep targeting ships in the Red Sea, linking their fight to the Palestinians’ struggle against Israel in Gaza. Their attacks have roiled the commercial shipping industry, forcing many vessels to take long detours around the southern tip of Africa.
• Taking on the Houthis is “like fighting fog,” said Yoel Guzansky, a researcher at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv. Even a determined effort to root out their stockpiles would take years, he cautioned. “They have lots of light weaponry that’s easy to hide and difficult to find,” he said.

GAZA (NORTH):

GAZA (SOUTH):

• Israeli Army continues their work to eliminate the leadership of Hamas

POST WAR GAZA:

• President Joe Biden remains keen on a two-state solution as a resolution to the Israel-Hamas war, national security adviser Jake Sullivan said Sunday (Feb 4^th). “The only long-term answer to peace in the region, to Israel’s security in the region, is a two-state solution, with Israel’s security guaranteed. A Palestinian state that also has security guarantees for Israel. That’s what we’re going to keep working for,” Sullivan told host George Stephanopoulos on ABC’s “This Week.”
• “We don’t design our policy toward Israel, or Gaza or the Middle East based on politics. We do it based on the national security interests of the United States. And we’ve been clear from the beginning that we believe that Israel has a right to respond to the horrific attacks of Oct. 7,” Sullivan said on “Face the Nation.”

IN THE NORTH (LEBANON):

• Israel’s military on Saturday (Feb 3^rd) issued its most detailed warning yet to Hezbollah in neighboring Lebanon that it would be “ready to attack immediately” if provoked, as it recounted its actions along the northern border during four months of war in Gaza and made a rare acknowledgement of dozens of airstrikes inside Syria against the militant group. “We do not choose war as our first priority, but we are certainly prepared,” military spokesperson Daniel Hagari said, adding: “We will continue to act wherever Hezbollah is present, we will continue to act wherever it is required in the Middle East. What is true for Lebanon is true for Syria, and is true for other more distant places.” The comments followed the defense minister’s warning that a cease-fire in Gaza against the militant group Hamas wouldn’t mean Israel wouldn’t attack Hezbollah as needed.

IN THE EAST (IRAQ/SYRIA):

JERUSALEM:

WEST BANK:

NEGOTIATIONS – HOSTAGE RELEASE – CEASE FIRE:

• U.S. National security adviser Jake Sullivan said Sunday “The goal is, in fact, to get a hostage deal in place as soon as possible. Ultimately, that comes down to Hamas,” Sullivan said. When asked by Stephanopoulos if a deal to release hostages is imminent, Sullivan said that he couldn’t say. “I can’t say it’s imminent, but ultimately, these kinds of negotiations unfold somewhat slowly until they unfold very quickly. And so it’s difficult to put a precise timetable on when something might come together or, frankly, if something might come together. But sitting here today, I cannot tell you it’s right around the corner,” Sullivan said.
• Hostage Deal Proposal, Committed to Permanent Cease-fire Demand: Osama Hamdan, a senior Hamas official in Beirut, said the group demands the release of thousands of Palestinian prisoners, as well as a permanent cease-fire – a condition standing at odds with the multi-stage proposal put forth by officials from Egypt, Israel, Qatar and the U.S.
• Hamas officials said Friday (Feb 2^nd) that the group is studying a proposed cease-fire deal that would include prolonged pauses in fighting in Gaza and swaps of Israeli hostages for Palestinian prisoners, but at the same time appeared to rule out some of its key components.
• The insistence on large-scale prisoner releases and on an end to the fighting in Gaza put the group at odds with the multi-stage proposal that officials from Egypt, Israel, Qatar and the United States put forth this week. The proposal does not include a permanent cease-fire. “There is no way that this will be acceptable by the resistance,” Hamdan told Lebanon’s LBC TV on Friday, referring to proposed successive pauses in fighting. Israeli leaders have said they will keep fighting until Hamas is crushed, even while agreeing to long pauses that are accompanied by the release of hostages
• Israeli Security Cabinet Mulls Proposed 142-day Hostage Deal, Cease-fire With Hamas: The plan, which proposes releasing one hostage daily during the cease-fire, faced significant criticism from cabinet members who opposed both the length of the cease-fire and the phased release of hostages, a source told Haaretz. ‘Such a deal will give Hamas oxygen,’ far-right minister Ben-Gvir said.
• Netanyahu said in the meeting that “there are three conditions that we cannot agree to: We cannot allow the cessation of the war – we embarked on this move to collapse Hamas; we cannot allow the release of thousands of terrorists – this is a fact whose meaning is clear to all of us; and we cannot allow the IDF to leave the Gaza Strip.”

GLOBAL RESPONSE & INVOLVEMENT:

 

Holy Land Scripture Series

*If you would like to gain more understanding of the history of this country and conflict from a scriptural standpoint we recommend you take our Holy Land Scripture Course created to accompany our Virtual Tour of the Holy Land. Link below:

 

QUESTIONS TO CONSIDER:

What should Israel do in order to secure peaceful borders and relations with the Palestinians and other Arab neighbors as well as facilitate the release the hostages still being held in Gaza?   

What should Hamas do to get needed support and help? (They are land-locked and restricted and are experiencing extreme economic conditions)

*We know the questions are MANY and the issues deep and complex. We hope the information shared on this blog will help you process all the information and issues.

 

*If you would like to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications when new posts are made please email Dr. Clark Anderson at clark@andersontours.com