Last Sunday night, a Lebanese soldier opened fire, killing a 31-year-old Israeli sergeant who was driving along the Israeli side of the border that separates the two countries. The initial reports of an exchange of fire in that area immediately brought to mind the events of 2006, which started with a cross-border raid and turned into an all-out war between Israel and Hezbollah.
That conflict started after Hezbollah’s Lebanese Shiite militias cut through the border fence, killing three Israelis and taking two others as hostages into Lebanon.
The incident this week, as it quickly became apparent, was not a Hezbollah operation and did not mark the start of another major conflict. But it highlighted the tense situation on Israel’s northern border and the near certainty that war will eventually return.