Israel says it’s ready for another war

00:00 05:09

Angus Colwell has narrated this article for you to listen to.

According to my phone, I’m in Beirut-Rafic Hariri International Airport. Except I’m not. The Israel Defence Forces have scrambled the GPS of everyone within about an hour’s drive of the Israel-Lebanon border. The same navigation system that tells my iPhone its location is the same navigation system that Hezbollah could use to identify targets in northern Israel. They’ve been firing across the border since 7 October, and the Israelis are fed up. They’ve evacuated 80 kibbutzim, nine villages, three community centres and two Arab villages. The phrase that ministers use to describe the displaced is ‘refugees in their own country’. The offensive in Gaza is winding down, and after that – says an official – ‘we are ready to deal with Lebanon’.

This week the British embassy advised people to leave Lebanon if they can. Officials sound resigned, prepared, perhaps raring for war on the northern front: ‘We are talking weeks, maybe days.’