Israeli airstrikes pound Lebanon and Gaza

National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, center, dances during a conference calling for Jewish resettlement of the Gaza Strip near the Israeli-Gaza border in southern Israel on Monday.

Hundreds of right-wing Israeli activists — including government ministers and members of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s parliamentary coalition — attended an event Monday calling for the Israeli government to establish Jewish settlements in the Gaza Strip.

Senior ministers who attended the event near the Gaza border included National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and Minister for Social Equality and Minister for Women’s Empowerment May Golan.

While the Israeli prime minister has said Israel does not intend to settle Gaza, Golan was among several members of Netanyahu’s Likud party who participated, in addition to Ben Gvir’s Otzma Yehudit (Jewish Power) and Smotrich’s Religious Zionist Party.

Calls for Israeli settlements in Gaza were accompanied by calls for the expulsion of the strip’s Palestinian population.

“As a result of the brutal massacre of the 7th of October, the Gaza Arabs lost the right to be here,” Daniella Weiss, known as the godmother of the Zionist settler movement, said to cheers and applause. “We are here with one clear purpose; the purpose is to settle the entire Gaza Strip, not just part of it, not just a few settlements, the entire Gaza Strip from north to south.”

Stages were set up around an empty desert near Kibbutz Be’eri overlooking the Gaza Strip, where people danced, sang and distributed flyers about the importance of resettlement to protect Isael’s security.

Several rounds of outgoing artillery fire into Gaza could be heard from the event.

Counterprotest: Across the hilltop, residents of the surrounding areas and kibbutzim held a counterprotest. Ron Shifroni, a resident of Kibbutz Be’eri, told CNN the Israelis who want to resettle Gaza “have fantasies” that they can just “send people away”, referring to the Palestinians. “It’s not going to happen. And they want to live there, not because it’s for security, but because they think this is what is ordained by God. The security is just an excuse,” he scoffed.

The White House was clear-eyed about the status of a diplomatic outcome in Gaza or Lebanon, conceding that negotiations toward a ceasefire are not “about to restart.”

His comments come after weeks of stalled ceasefire talks. Both President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris renewed calls for restarting the negotiations in the wake of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar’s killing.

US officials have had “some initial conversations,” Kirby said, with Israeli counterparts and “continue to engage in intensive diplomacy to see what can be done to try to find a path to a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah.”

The US has also expressed a “strong desire to see what can be done to find a diplomatic path forward to get the hostages home,” he said.

US envoy Amos Hochstein is in Beirut Monday, Kirby noted, where he is working “to see what could be in the realm of the possible in terms of trying to find a meaningful ceasefire.”

Earlier, CNN reported that US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will depart Monday for a high-stakes trip to Israel and the Middle East as the United States seeks to move forward with long-stalled negotiations to bring back the hostages and end the war in Gaza in the wake of Yahya Sinwar’s death.

President Joe Biden appears during a news conference in the Brady Press Briefing Room at the White House on October 4.

President Joe Biden is “deeply concerned” following the leak of highly classified US intelligence on Israel’s plans to attack Iran and will be “actively monitoring” the investigation, according to national security spokesperson John Kirby.

He added: “You can rest assured that he will be actively monitoring the progress of the investigative effort to figure out how this happened, and obviously he’ll be very interested in hearing any mitigation measures and recommendations that come as a result of the investigative efforts.”

Kirby added that they do not yet know how the documents were released and that the Department of Defense is continuing their investigation.

Kirby also said that “at this time” they have no reason to believe similar documents will be released.

“We don’t have any indication at this point that there’s an expectation that there will be additional documents like this finding their way into the public domain,” he said.

Kirby also confirmed that the US has been in communication with the Israelis about the disclosure, but did not provide any details of those conversations.

More background: The documents, dated October 15 and 16, began circulating online Friday after being posted on Telegram by an account called “Middle East Spectator.” They are marked top secret and have markings indicating they are meant to be seen only by the US and its “Five Eyes” allies — Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the United Kingdom.

Documents of Hezbollah-affiliated bank Qard al-Hassan are scattered at the site of an Israeli airstrike in Beirut, Lebanon, on Monday.

Israel’s attacks on the offices of the Hezbollah-affiliated bank Qard al-Hassan were also some of the most intense strikes since the start of its offensive in Lebanon more than a month ago.

Some of the attacks destroyed whole residential blocks. Nearly a dozen of these airstrikes hit the southern suburbs of Beirut – one of the targets was just a couple of hundreds of meters away from the country’s only commercial airport. Planes were seen landing on the tarmac as balls of fire lit up the night sky.

Israel said it aimed to cripple Hezbollah’s financial network as part of a larger bid to destroy the militant group’s infrastructure. Qard al-Hassan, it said, was the main vehicle through which Hezbollah paid its fighters’ salaries. But these lending offices also provide interest-free loans to working-class Shia Muslim families.

Keep in mind: As with much of Hezbollah’s institutions, services that fuel the militant group’s activities also provide a social safety net for Shia civilians in a virtually failed state. Where public institutions falter in Lebanon, sectarian factions step in. This is the bread and butter of the country’s kleptocratic power-sharing system which has chipped away at the country’s central government for decades, and Hezbollah excels at it.

Because Hezbollah is so deeply embedded in its Shia Muslim community, and in Lebanon at large, Israel may defend any infrastructure-related target as one that damages the group. But the more Israel’s strikes stray from Hezbollah’s military structure, the more Lebanese civilians and the state itself stand to suffer.

Israel intercepted five unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) in the area of the Mediterranean Sea on Monday before they crossed into Israeli territory, the Israeli military said in a statement.

The Israeli military added that “there is no concern for a security incident in the area of Ben Gurion Airport.”

Israeli media had earlier reported that flight departures at Ben Gurion International Airport were briefly suspended after sirens sounded in “dozens” of northern settlements due to projectiles fired from Lebanon.

A spokesperson for Israel Airports Authority told CNN that departing flights were briefly halted for 15 to 20 minutes due to the drones, per instructions from the Israeli Air Force. Arriving flights were not impacted.

U.S. special envoy Amos Hochstein speaks during a press conference in Beirut, Lebanon, on October 21.

The United States wants a stronger enforcement of the UN resolution that ended the 2006 Israel Hezbollah war, rather than just a reaffirmation of commitment, US envoy Amos Hochstein said during a trip to Beirut Monday.

“Simply committing” to the UN Security Council resolution 1701 “is not enough,” he said in a televised news conference after meeting Nabih Berri, the speaker of the Lebanese parliament and leader of the Shiite Amal party which is allied to Hezbollah. “Resolution 1701 was successful in ending the war in 2006, but we must be honest that no one did anything to implement it… that must change.”

Remember: The resolution called for a permanent ceasefire in Lebanon and stipulated that Hezbollah must withdraw north of the Litani River in southern Lebanon, and that only the Lebanese military should hold positions in the area between the Litani and Israel.

The US envoy said resolution 1701 continues to be the framework to be followed for an eventual ceasefire in the current Hezbollah-Israel war, but that stipulation needs to be “put in place that allows for confidence that it will be implemented.”

Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati has reiterated several times his government’s commitment to implementing the resolution by sending more troops from the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) to southern Lebanon.

US efforts are now focused on taking advantage of Israeli military pressure in Lebanon to enforce a “real implementation” of UN resolution 1701 and the return of an empowered LAF force in southern Lebanon, a senior US official told CNN.

Israeli authorities dismantled a “spy network” of seven Israeli citizens accused of working for Iran, Israel Police and the Israel Security Agency (ISA) said in a statement Monday.

Those arrested were “gathering sensitive information on IDF bases and energy infrastructure,” the statement said, adding that they were all Jewish citizens from Haifa and other areas in the north of the country.

Their operations spanned over a period of more than two years, the statement said, and included “extensive reconnaissance missions on IDF bases nationwide” that were financially compensated, often through cryptocurrency.

Israel Police and the ISA said the arrest shows Iran’s ongoing efforts “to recruit and exploit Israeli citizens for espionage and terrorism within Israel,” adding that an indictment will be filed in the coming days.

The arrests come as Israel prepares for an attack against Iran in response to Tehran’s missile barrage on October 1, which Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed Tehran “will pay” for.

Yahya Sinwar, leader of the Palestinian Hamas movement, hosts a meeting in Gaza on April 13, 2022.

The death of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar is likely to intensify the years-long insurgency he started against Israel, experts say, with the group changing its methods as its leadership gets decimated.

While Israel is fighting a semi-conventional war against Hamas, it fails to understand the fight the group wants, which is “an open-ended insurgency on the ground against Israeli forces in Gaza,” Hussein Ibish, a senior resident scholar at the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington, DC, told CNN.

Hamas’ war “has just started,” Ibish said, and it is already taking the form of “disparately organized Hamas cells of guerillas and insurgents” that do not require an “integrated, vertical command and control structure.”

The group is likely to survive using low-grade, non-sophisticated weaponry, he said, including pistols, small machine-guns and even home-made improvised explosive devices (IED). They can operate under dire conditions, and “their people are willing to die,” Ibish added.

Other nations fighting non-state groups have faced similar situations, Ibish said – including the Soviet Union in Afghanistan, the US in Vietnam, and even the Israelis themselves in 1982, when an invasion to expel the Palestine Liberation Organization from Beirut only created the much more powerful Hezbollah.

Frank Lowenstein, who served as former US Special Envoy for Middle East peace under the Obama administration, said that while the Israelis “are understandably feeling empowered by Sinwar’s death, nobody should be under any illusion that Hamas has been defeated,” as there is “no way to kill an ideology.”

Lowenstein said that Sinwar’s death creates a leadership vacuum in Gaza, which if not filled, risks any meaningful negotiations or agreement on a hostage-ceasefire deal, which the US views as essential.

40-year-old father of four, Eliran Mizrahi deployed to Gaza after the deadly Hamas-led attack on Israel on October 7, 2023.

The Israeli military reservist returned a different person, traumatized by what he had witnessed in the war against Hamas in the strip, his family told CNN. Six months after he was first sent to fight, he was struggling with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) back at home. Before he was due to redeploy, he took his own life.

The Israeli military has said it is providing care for thousands of soldiers who are suffering from PTSD or mental illnesses caused by trauma during the war. It is unclear how many have taken their own lives, as the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) has not provided an official figure.

One year on, Israel’s war in Gaza has killed more than 42,000 people, according to the health ministry in the strip, with the United Nations reporting that most of the dead are women and children.

The war, launched after Hamas killed 1,200 people and took more than 250 hostage, is already Israel’s longest since the Jewish state was established. And as it now expands to Lebanon, some soldiers say they dread being drafted into yet another conflict.

Read more about how Israeli soldiers are dealing with trauma after returning from war.

Flames and smoke after Israeli airstrikes on Beirut, Lebanon, on October 20.

Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said on Monday that Israel struck over 15 buildings in Lebanon’s capital Beirut targeting Hezbollah’s financial institutions, adding that it will keep hitting the group until it collapses.

An Israeli airstrike hit a branch of a Hezbollah-affiliated financial institution near Beirut airport on Sunday night, according to Lebanon’s National News Agency (NNA). The strike on the branch of Al-Qard Al-Hasan in southern Beirut, near the Rafic Hariri International Airport, was one of at least 11 on the southern suburbs of the Lebanese capital Sunday night, according to NNA. Several branches of Al-Qard Al-Hasan were hit, it said.

Some background: Founded in 1983, Al-Qard Al-Hassan is a non-profit financial institution linked to Hezbollah, according to Hezbollah-affiliated TV channel Al-Manar. It offers interest-free loans to alleviate poverty within the Shia community, based on Islamic principles of lending without interest, Al-Manar says.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will depart Monday for a high-stakes trip to Israel and the Middle East as the United States seeks to move forward with long-stalled negotiations to bring back the hostages and end the war in Gaza in the wake of Yahya Sinwar’s death.

US officials, including President Joe Biden, have stressed to their Israeli counterparts to capitalize on the Hamas leaders’ killing to bring the more than year-long conflict to a conclusion. Biden announced last week that he would dispatch his top diplomat to the region with those aims.

Still, questions remain about the impact of Sinwar’s death on the hostage and ceasefire negotiations — discussions that had all but collapsed mere weeks ago — and it remains to be seen whether Netanyahu or Hamas is truly prepared to end the war.

“Today, evil has suffered a heavy blow, but the task before us is not yet complete,” the Israeli Prime Minister said in remarks following Sinwar’s death.

Moreover, the specter of Israel’s response to Iran for Tehran’s missile attack’s earlier this month still looms large, bringing with it the potential for regional conflagration.

That risk of escalation is compounded as Israel has continued its heavy military campaign in Lebanon against Hezbollah. Blinken plans to “discuss the need to reach a diplomatic resolution to the conflict between Israel and Hezbollah,” the State Department said in an announcement about his trip.

Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, right, meets with U.S. special envoy Amos Hochstein in Beirut, Lebanon, on October 21.

US envoy Amos Hochstein is in Beirut for talks with Nabih Berri, speaker of the Lebanese parliament and leader of the Shiite Amal party that is allied with the militant group Hezbollah.

A key figure in negotiations for a ceasefire between Hezbollah and Israel, Berri has held talks with Hochstein several times over the past year.

Hochstein is US President Joe Biden’s point-man for talks between Israel and Hezbollah but has so far failed to stop the escalation of the conflict.

A Palestinian resident has described the “catastrophic” situation in northern Gaza, where he said he has been trapped in his home with dozens of others for more than two weeks as Israeli military operations intensify in the area.

Imran Jaber, a professor and resident of Jabalya refugee camp, told CNN he’s been “besieged” for 17 days along with his family and five children “under very extreme conditions.”

Eighty others, including women, children and elderly people, are also sheltering in a 500-square-meter space (5,381 square feet) at his home after their houses were destroyed in Israeli strikes, Jaber said.

Since October 6, the Israeli military had made life in north Gaza “impossible for Palestinians,” many of whom were already facing starvation and repeated displacement, the United Nations Human Rights Office said on Sunday.

In Jabalya, “you have two options, either you die from the strikes or die from the diseases as a result of no treatment or hospitals or medication, or you die from hunger because there is no food or water.”

The UN said intensified military operations are “resulting in scores of civilian fatalities and near total lack of humanitarian aid reaching populations in the north.”

Fuel, which operates the water distillation pumps, hasn’t entered northern Gaza, Jaber says, meaning they haven’t had any clean water for about 20 days since the latest Israeli incursion began.

A UNRWA worker and displaced Palestinians check the damage inside a UN school-turned-refuge in the Al-Shati refugee camp near Gaza City following a reported Israeli strike on October 19.

A worker from the UN’s main relief agency in Gaza has told CNN that the aid crisis is severe, with “almost nothing is getting into Gaza in terms of humanitarian supplies.”

Sam Rose, from the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), said that his teams had heard reports of “well-intentioned aid falling from the sky, landing on tents and killing people.”

CNN reported this weekend that an airdropped aid pallet had killed a 3-year-old. Palestinians in Gaza have described airdrops as dangerous and humiliating, while also voicing practical concerns about the content of the deliveries.

UNRWA sites hit: Attacks hit at least three facilities run by UNRWA in the north over the past five days, Rose told CNN’s Anna Coren.

“Just in the past five days we’ve had three attacks on UNRWA installations in the north that have led to large losses of life,” Rose said, speaking from Khan Younis in southern Gaza. CNN has reached out to the Israel Defense Forces for comment on these strikes.

Israel renewed its deadly military offensive in northern Gaza this month. Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians there face starvation.

Rose said the situation in northern Gaza is “beyond anything we’ve seen since the start of the war.”

Several medical non-governmental organizations still don’t know why Israeli authorities barred their entry to Gaza, the CEO of one of the groups told CNN.

Last week, the World Health Organization accused Israel of blocking multiple medical organizations from entering Gaza — the first time entire health agencies have been denied access to the enclave during the war. COGAT, the Israeli agency that coordinates delivery of Gaza aid, denied the accusations.

At least seven medical NGOs were informed they would no longer be permitted to enter the Palestinian enclave, two sources told CNN last week, including US-based FAJR Scientific.

Israeli authorities did not communicate their reasons to the WHO, Mosab Nasser, CEO of FAJR Scientific, told CNN’s Rosemary Church on Monday.

Nasser told CNN that FAJR Scientific is “highly specialized in complex surgeries” and says their expertise are highly needed as “80% of the injuries that are brought to the hospitals in Gaza are blast injuries” with primarily women and children among those wounded.

Nasser said FAJR Scientific maintains its apolitical position and neutrality similar with the WHO, which it operates under.

Rescue workers use a bulldozer to remove rubble at the site of an Israeli airstrike on Sunday night that hit several branches of the Hezbollah run Al-Qard Al-Hassan Association in Beirut, Lebanon, on October 21.

Israel’s series of strikes targeting a Hezbollah-affiliated financial institution in Lebanon aims to shake the Shia community’s trust in the militant group, according to a senior Israeli intelligence official.

The Israeli military on Monday said it struck branches of the Hezbollah-affiliated Al-Qard Al-Hassan Association overnight, claiming the organization held funds used to directly finance the militant group’s paramilitary activities.

The “main objective [of the strikes] is to affect the trust between Hezbollah and a lot of the Shia community that uses this association as a banking system,” the senior Israeli intelligence official said Sunday.

Some background: Founded in 1983, Al-Qard Al-Hassan is a non-profit financial institution linked to Hezbollah, according to Hezbollah-affiliated TV channel Al-Manar. It offers interest-free loans to alleviate poverty within the Shia community, based on Islamic principles of lending without interest, Al-Manar says.

The strikes would “have a lot of effect on the capability of Al-Qard al-Hassan to have people using its facilities and its sources,” the Israeli official added.

Though the Israeli official said Hezbollah used the association to “pay salaries to all the operatives,” they also said it “also serves many civilians” among “about 300,000” customers.

A Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) anti-ballistic missile defense system is displayed during a Made in America showcase on the South Lawn of the White House, on July 15, 2019, in Washington.

The missile defense system sent by the United States to Israel is “in place” and ready for use when needed, US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said on Monday.

His comments come as Israel prepares for a strike in response to Iran’s October 1 missile attack, which could prompt a counter-response from Tehran and its proxies.

What is THAAD? The THAAD defense system is one of the US military’s most powerful anti-missile weapons, capable of intercepting ballistic missiles at ranges of 150 to 200 kilometers (93 to 124 miles) and with a near-perfect success rate in testing.

Using a combination of advanced radar systems and interceptors, THAAD, short for Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense, is the only US missile defense system that can engage and destroy short-, medium-, and intermediate-range ballistic missiles both inside or outside the atmosphere during their terminal phase of flight – or dive on their target.

Austin’s response to leaked intelligence: Austin also commented on reports that two highly classified US intelligence documents detailing some of Israel’s preparations for a strike on Iran were leaked on Telegram, saying “we take these types of things very, very seriously and we investigate if there is any type of incident.” He would not comment specifically on the documents, however, or provide any details about an investigation into their disclosure.

Palestinians carry the bodies wrapped in shroud to Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital after an Israeli attack on Deir al Balah, Gaza on October 20.

The head of a beleaguered hospital in northern Gaza has described a desperate situation under “around the clock” Israeli bombardment, saying a UN aid mission had been prevented from reaching the facility and patients awaiting evacuation were stuck.

In a voice note to CNN punctuated by the sound of heavy bombardment in the background, Kamal Adwan Hospital director Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya said the “situation is very, very difficult” at the facility amid a renewed Israeli military offensive in the north of the enclave.

A UN delegation scheduled to bring fuel, medical teams, food, and other supplies was not allowed to come through, Abu Safiya said.

And 13 patients with permission to be evacuated to Gaza City were prevented by Israel from being transferred, with the military citing “ongoing difficult events,” according to Abu Safiya.

The patients, the staff accompanying them and members of the World Health Organization were “now staying with us in the hospital,” and there would be a new attempt to transfer them early Monday, Abu Safiya said.

An Israeli strike on northern Gaza this weekend killed at least 87 people, the enclave’s health ministry said. Abu Safiya said the death toll from that strike could be as high as 95, “including those missing under the rubble.”

Smoke rise from an Israeli airstrike on Dahiyeh in the southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, on October 20.

Fighting is raging in both Lebanon and Gaza. Israeli airstrikes targeted a financial institution linked to Hezbollah in southern Beirut, and an Israeli strike in northern Gaza has killed at least 87 people.

Israel has vowed to destroy Hezbollah and keep fighting Hamas in Gaza.

Israel is also preparing to retaliate against Iran’s missile barrage this month. The US is investigating a leak of highly classified intelligence about Israel’s planned response, sources told CNN.

Here are the latest developments:

Israeli strikes overnight in various parts of Lebanon have caused casualties and damage, according to Lebanon’s national news agency NNA.

In eastern Lebanon, Israeli strikes targeted Baalbek city and the nearby town of Hizzine, NNA reported. A number of casualties were reported, and rescue efforts were ongoing to remove people from under the rubble.

Israeli strikes also targeted the southern coastal city of Tyre, destroying a building and causing damage to several houses around it, NNA reported. Several Israeli strikes also targeted various towns in southern Lebanon.

The Israeli military had earlier issued evacuation warnings for some areas of Lebanon, including Tyre.

The Israeli military said Sunday that its air force carried out strikes in Beirut, southern Lebanon, and “deep within Lebanese territory,” targeting Hezbollah sites where money that served the military wing of the organization was stored.

The funds were stored at the Hezbollah-affiliated Al-Qard Al-Hassan Association, which finances the groups’ activities directly, “including the purchase [of] weapons and payments to operatives in Hezbollah’s military wing,” according to the Israeli military.

Some background: Founded in 1983, Al-Qard Al-Hassan is a non-profit financial institution linked to Hezbollah, according to Hezbollah-affiliated TV channel Al-Manar. It offers interest-free loans to alleviate poverty within the Shia community, based on Islamic principles of lending without interest, Al-Manar says.

Workers clean a street as smoke rises from a destroyed building that was hit by an Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, in the southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon on October 20.

It’s Monday morning in the Middle East. Here’s what happened this weekend:

• Airstrikes hit Beirut: Israeli airstrikes hit multiple branches of a Hezbollah-linked financial institution in Beirut on Sunday. The Israeli military had warned it planned to strike locations belonging to the Al-Qard Al-Hassan Association to block Hezbollah’s access to financial resources.

• Lebanon death toll keeps rising: The death toll from Israeli strikes in Lebanon since September 16 has passed 1,800, according to a CNN tally of ministry figures.

• US intelligence leak: The US is investigating a leak of highly classified intelligence about Israel’s planned response to Iran’s major missile attack earlier this month, sources tell CNN.

• Strike targets Netanyahu’s house: Iran has denied involvement in the launch of a drone toward Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu’s home in central Israel on Saturday.

• Devastation in northern Gaza: An Israeli strike on northern Gaza killed at least 87 people, the enclave’s health ministry said, with graphic footage showing children among the dead.

• Aid airdrop kills child: Family members in central Gaza have described their devastation after an airdropped aid pallet killed their 3-year-old child. Palestinians in Gaza have described the experience of receiving airdrops as dangerous and humiliating, while also voicing practical concerns about the content of the deliveries.

• Israel vows to destroy Hezbollah: Israel’s defense minister Yoav Gallant used a visit to its northern border Sunday to rally his troops fighting Hezbollah in southern Lebanon, telling them they are “moving from defeating the enemy to destroying it.”

Israel's Foreign Minister Israel Katz attends a meeting in Jerusalem on October 7.

Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz says his ministry will pursue diplomatic and legal action against France following the decision by Paris to ban Israeli companies whose weapons are being used in Gaza and Lebanon from participating in a top naval warfare trade show.

He said the boycott of Israeli companies “with the imposition of unacceptable conditions, are anti-democratic measures that in our eyes are not acceptable, especially between friendly nations. I urge President Macron to cancel them completely.”

On its website, Euronaval says the “exhibition organizers acknowledge the decision of the [French] National Defense and Security Council dated October 1, 2024, which stipulates that Israeli companies wishing to participate in the Euronaval exhibition may do so.”

But it adds: “They may have an exhibition stand, provided that their products are not used in military operations in Gaza and Lebanon.”

Remember: While France has historically provided Israel with arms, in recent weeks the relationship between the two countries has become strained as French President Emmanuel Macron called for an end to arms exports to Israel to try and push for a ceasefire in Lebanon and Gaza.

On October 5, Macron called for the complete suspension of the sale of arms “used in the war in Gaza,” and stressed that France had not been involved in their supply.

CNN’s Antoinette Radford contributed reporting.