The Levant Files

Israeli commentator Amos Harel has warned that the image of an Israeli flag flying over Beaufort Castle in southern Lebanon is fueling “artificial excitement” that masks a faltering strategy in the current Lebanon war, Haaretz reported on Monday. In a column for the Israeli daily, Harel writes that a single photograph of Israeli and Golani Brigade flags atop the medieval fortress was enough to “completely sideline the necessary conversation about the state of the current war in Lebanon.” “Instead of raising the questions that must be asked about the dubious strategy of the war in the north and the lack of a solution to the threat of exploding drones guided by fiber-optic cables,” he argues, “we got a nostalgic outpouring about this thrilling return to a historic site.” Hezbollah is launching “dozens every day” of such drones, Harel notes, yet the public debate has fixated on symbolism rather than on how to protect troops and northern communities. Harel recalls that Beaufort was first s...

Israel intensifies its military campaign in Lebanon as cross-border rocket fire and evacuation warnings escalate fears of a wider regional conflict. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has ordered fresh strikes on Beirut, accusing Hezbollah of violating an existing cease-fire, according to Haaretz, which reported the escalation as part of its live coverage of the widening conflict on Monday. The order marks a sharp intensification of Israeli operations in Lebanon, coming alongside reciprocal fire between Iran and the United States even as the two sides pursue negotiations aimed at ending the war. The renewed assault on the Lebanese capital follows a series of rocket launches from southern Lebanon that triggered air-raid sirens across northern Israel. The Israel Defense Forces said two projectiles were intercepted, with no immediate reports of casualties. Israeli officials framed the Beirut strikes as a direct response to what they characterized as repeated breaches of the truce by the Ir...

Iran's government is engulfed in its gravest leadership crisis in years after reports that President Masoud Pezeshkian has submitted his resignation, accusing the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps of seizing control of the state. Tehran flatly denies it. But the very intensity of the denials, and the substance of the alleged complaint, point to a rift at the top that the regime is struggling to contain. The London-based opposition outlet Iran International, citing a single anonymous official, reported on Sunday that Pezeshkian sent a formal letter to the office of Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei asking to step down. According to that account, the president wrote in unusually sharp language that the state's management structure had "effectively gone off the official tracks" and that key levers of power now sit under the full control of a group of IRGC commanders. He said he and his cabinet had been cut out of vital decisions and could no longer govern. The reported tri...

The Levant Files Sunday Movie Nights kicks off today at 20:00 Cyprus time (GMT+3) with the first part of a special BBC documentary on the Iranian Revolution of 1979. Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 The second part of the documentary will follow the next Sundays at the same time. Source: Youtube - Shahzad Raja Channel Please note: The Levant Files does not host films or documentaries. It only shares publicly available links and fully respects copyright rules.

A 12-hour cascade of incursions, airstrikes and drone attacks shatters an already-collapsing ceasefire The Middle East lurched closer to all-out regional war overnight as Israeli forces simultaneously deepened their occupation of Lebanon, pushed fresh ground incursions into southern Syria, and Iran rained drones and missiles down on Kurdish targets in northern Iraq — a triple escalation unfolding in barely half a day. In Lebanon, Israel expanded its ground assault on Sunday into what officials describe as its broadest incursion in more than a quarter of a century. Israeli forces now occupy roughly 2,000 square kilometres — nearly one-fifth of the country — having pushed far beyond the Litani River, with evacuation orders now stretching north toward the Zahrani. Troops have reached Zawtar al-Sharqiyah and Choukine on the edge of Nabatieh, a Hezbollah stronghold. Hezbollah answered with more than 300 projectiles fired at Israeli soldiers and northern Israel over the weekend; dawn strikes...

Inside the conservative movement, the fight isn't over whether to stop a nuclear Iran — it's over whether Trump should talk, threaten, or strike. For the movement that put Donald Trump back in the White House on a promise to end forever wars, no foreign-policy question cuts deeper than Iran. As negotiations with Tehran grind forward, the MAGA coalition has split — not over the threat, but over the method. Almost everyone on the populist right agrees Iran must never obtain a nuclear weapon. Almost no one agrees on how to guarantee it. The cleavage runs through the heart of Trumpism itself. On one flank stand the dealmakers, figures like Larry Kudlow who cast sanctions, military pressure, and blunt ultimatums not as warmongering but as leverage — the raw materials of "the art of the deal" applied to a regime that respects only strength. In their telling, talks are a feature of coercion, not a retreat from it. Trump corners the mullahs, extracts concessions Barack Obama ...

U.S. President floats a “very good” agreement with Tehran even as American officials contradict one another and Iranian seafarers report the hostile maritime siege is still in force. U.S. President Donald Trump has once again claimed that Washington is close to a “very good” deal with Iran, praising the experience of Tehran's negotiators while insisting he is “in no rush.” Speaking to Fox News, Trump said disputes are best resolved through diplomacy. Yet the remarks landed more like a publicity show than a policy statement, coming as Washington simultaneously hardened its demands and as competing American accounts of the talks exposed deep contradictions within the administration. According to the Iranian-state supported Nournews, Trump repeated his familiar line that the goal is to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon — an assertion Tehran has long rejected, reaffirming the peaceful nature of its program and conditioning any agreement on sanctions relief, the protection of...

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu views the emerging US-Iran agreement as a disaster and holds President Donald Trump responsible for it, a senior political source told Ben Caspit of Al-Monitor. With the Tehran regime still in power and a possible accord taking shape, members of Netanyahu's circle warn that Israel's longest-serving leader could pay the ultimate political price as elections approach. The prospect of a deal has fueled speculation that Netanyahu may be forced to step down to avoid losing the upcoming vote and risking prison over his corruption indictment. “This time, the prime minister's hands are tied. He is completely paralyzed and knows that he will not be able to do anything,” one associate told Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity, adding that Netanyahu now longs for the days of Presidents Joe Biden and even Barack Obama. “Now, all he can do is salute Trump.” Since Trump announced an April 8 ceasefire with Tehran, opponents have rejected Netanyahu...

A separatist movement long confined to Pakistan sees opportunity in Tehran's weakness — even as analysts caution it is not yet ready to open a front inside Iran. As US and Israeli strikes battered Iran through early 2026, one actor has watched the unfolding crisis more intently than most, and with more to gain. The Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA), a separatist organization that has waged a decades-long insurgency against Pakistan, has positioned itself to exploit any opening created by Tehran's distress. Yet for all its calculation, the group remains largely absent from international headlines dominated by missiles over Tehran and diplomacy in Islamabad. The BLA's intentions are not hidden. In March 2026, the group issued a formal statement welcoming the US-Israeli strikes on Iran and, according to regional reporting, urged the attackers to be "more effective, coordinated and result-oriented." Analysts read the endorsement less as ideological alignment than as a...