Daily News Brief

October 1, 2024

Top of the Agenda

Israel’s military launched ground raids into southern Lebanon early today as part of what Israel called “limited, localized, and targeted” raids against Hezbollah in the country. The operation was the first incursion of Israel Defence Forces (IDF) entering on the ground into Lebanon since the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah war. It was not immediately clear how many troops had entered the country; Israel’s military ordered the evacuation of nearly two dozen Lebanese communities, which came in the hours after it sent its forces over the border. The United Nations peacekeeping force in Lebanon and countries including Italy, Spain, and the United Kingdom (UK) called for de-escalation of the conflict, with UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy saying the costs of a regional Middle East war would be “huge.”

Israeli forces are continuing to amass in the country’s north, near its border with Lebanon, while Hezbollah said that it had fired missiles at a target on the outskirts of Tel Aviv, near where Israeli intelligence is headquartered. Israel’s military also announced restrictions in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv that include limits on public gatherings. (AP, Reuters, NYT)

Analysis

“Few nations have ever achieved their war objectives via air action alone: Air power is most effective when used in a combined arms offensive in conjunction with ground power. And Hezbollah will be all the more reluctant to stop its rocketing of northern Israel after the death of its leader; to do so now would be a virtual admission of defeat that would badly dent its aura of power,” CFR Senior Fellow Max Boot writes in the Washington Post.

“As both Israel and Hezbollah contemplate the prospect of escalating their conflict, they should take into account the context in which a new war would take place: a period of intense precarity in Lebanon,” Arab Barometer’s MaryClare Roche and Michael Robbins write for Foreign Affairs. “An Israeli military campaign in Lebanon would significantly magnify all the difficulties ordinary citizens already face, and many would come to see supporting Hezbollah as a pragmatic way to defend their homeland, making it harder for Israel to achieve its goals.” 

Read the full suite of Foreign Affairs and CFR.org resources on Israel and the current conflict.

Pacific Rim

Ishiba Shigeru was inducted as Japan’s prime minister today. His cabinet picks include a finance minister seen as a proponent of former leader Abe Shinzo’s “Abenomics” expansionary fiscal and monetary policies, a move seen as an attempt at balancing after Ishiba’s own comments in the past praising fiscal control. Only two of the twenty cabinet members named are women, a decrease from five in the last administration. (Kyodo, Reuters)

This episode of Why It Matters podcast discusses the female leader gap across the globe. 

Indonesia/Switzerland: Switzerland’s top court ruled that its country’s authorities could seize decades-old bank accounts in the name of the brother of Indonesia’s president-elect as part of a long-running tax investigation. Hashim Djojohadikusumo, President-Elect Prabowo Subianto’s brother and advisor, lived in Geneva in the late 1990s. He did not comment on the development but in July said Swiss authorities were being “very, very unreasonable.” (FT)

South and Central Asia

Junior doctors in the state reignited a work stoppage today that they had previously paused when the government said it would work to address safety demands following the rape and murder of a colleague. The doctors’ movement said the government’s approach was insufficient; the government said it had reached out to demonstrators, and measures such as installing safety cameras will take time. (NDTV)

China/India: Talks on border clashes between the countries have opened options for a diplomatic resolution of the dispute, India’s army leader said today. They’ve resolved the “low-hanging fruits,” while some difficult outstanding issues persist, he added. (Reuters)

Middle East and North Africa

The purchase of German chemical producer Covestro, which makes plastics and chemicals for the auto, construction, and engineering sectors, is ADNOC’s largest acquisition ever. It comes as Abu Dhabi is trying to reduce the country’s economic dependence on oil. (Reuters) 

In this YouTube Short, International Energy Agency leader Fatih Birol lays out the challenges in financing renewable energy. 

Sub-Saharan Africa

Teams from the humanitarian organization helped treat more than two victims and survivors of sexual violence every hour in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) last year, totaling more than 25,000—the highest number it ever recorded in the country. The trend heightened further upward in the first part of 2024, it said, calling on national and international stakeholders to respect international humanitarian law and improve conditions for displaced people. (MSF)

CFR’s Center for Preventive Action monitors the conflict and displacement in DRC. 

Kenya: Amid a rift between President William Ruto and his Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua, the legislative majority leader said lawmakers plan to launch impeachment proceedings against Gachagua. (Reuters)

Europe

Former Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte became Secretary-General of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) today, calling for the group to ensure that “Ukraine prevails as a sovereign, independent, democratic nation.” His tenure begins as Kyiv reshuffles its senior defense officials; Ukraine’s defense minister said today it was dismissing three deputies. (Reuters)

At a CFR event last week, outgoing NATO leader Jens Stoltenberg reflected on his ten years in office and what’s ahead for the organization. 

France: A trial against twenty-seven people including far-right National Rally party head Marine Le Pen for allegedly embezzling European Union funds began in Paris yesterday. The European Parliament estimated nearly $8 million were misappropriated; Le Pen denies wrongdoing. (Le Monde)

Americas

Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo takes office today in Mexico City, where she formerly served as mayor. She will oversee a sweeping legislative majority, entrenched security problems, a modestly growing economy, and a scheduled review of the U.S.-Mexico-Canada trade agreement in 2026. (Bloomberg) 

Haiti: The UN Security Council voted yesterday to extend its endorsement of Haiti’s Kenya-led multinational security mission by one year. While a prior draft of the resolution called for transitioning the mission to an official UN peacekeeping operation, the adopted text did not mention such a shift. (RFI)

Global

Workers at seaports on the U.S. east and gulf coasts began a work stoppage today in a dispute over wages and automation in the workplace. If the strike lasts more than a few days, it “has the magnitude to really throw a giant wrench in global supply chains,” the manager of national industrial research at Newmark said. (CNBC)

U.S. Campaign 2024

Vice Presidential candidates JD Vance and Tim Walz will take the stage in their debate tonight in New York City. The event is expected to be more closely watched than vice presidential debates of other years as the polling between presidential tickets remains tight nationwide and across swing states. CBS said its moderators do not plan to focus on live fact-checking; rather, viewers who watch the event on CBS will see a QR code they can scan to look at real-time fact checks online. (BBC, NYT) 

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