Netanyahu says Israel will widen its invasion of southern Lebanon

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Photo: Reuters Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced on Sunday that Israel will widen its invasion of southern Lebanon.

Netanyahu said Israel would expand what he called the “existing security strip” in Lebanon as Israeli forces continue to target the Iranian-backed Hezbollah militant group. “We are determined to fundamentally change the situation in the north,” he said on a visit to northern Israel, adding that “Hezbollah still has residual capability to fire rockets at us”.

There were no immediate details.

In Lebanon, officials say more than 1,100 people have been killed in the fighting since the Iran war began.

Also on Sunday, a top Iranian official warned the US against a ground invasion, saying its troops would be set “on fire”, as regional diplomats met in Pakistan in hopes of opening direct US-Iran talks and ending the month-long war.

Iran’s parliament speaker, Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, said Iranian forces were “waiting for the arrival of American troops on the ground to set them on fire and punish their regional partners forever”, according to Iranian state media.

He also dismissed the talks as a cover after some 2,500 US Marines trained in amphibious landings arrived in the Middle East.

Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar on Sunday said Islamabad will soon host talks between the US and Iran.

Dar did not specify whether the talks would be direct or indirect.

There was no immediate word from the United States or Iran. “Pakistan is very happy that both Iran and the US have expressed their confidence in Pakistan’s facilitation” of the talks, which will happen in the “coming days”, Dar said in a televised speech after the Islamabad meeting.

The war has threatened global supplies of oil, natural gas and fertiliser and disrupted air travel.

Iran’s grip on the strategic Strait of Hormuz has shaken markets and prices, and now the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels’ entry into the war could threaten shipping on another crucial waterway, the Bab el-Mandeb strait to the Red Sea. “We don’t know at what moment our homes could be targeted,” said Razzak Saghir al-Mousawi, 71, describing relentless air strikes as Iranians crossing into Iraq urged the United States to end the war. “I am definitely afraid.” Israel’s parliament, meanwhile, will vote overnight on the 2026 budget that provides for a massive rise in military spending with the country at war on more than one front.

The defence budget will rise by m

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