Update: Hezbollah - Israel Sunday Strikes

We’re learning a bit more about the dueling strikes between Hezbollah and Israel that took place Sunday morning. Not earth shaking news, but news that fleshes out what we already knew.

Recall, first, that Israel’s huge 100 plane attack was, actually, quite limited in scope. It was confined to a 5 km strip along the Lebanon border. So, intense, but quite limited. Israel claims that they took out “thousands” of missiles and missile launchers, but to believe that you have to believe that Hezbollah conveniently located “thousands” of missiles and their launchers in that narrow strip along the border. Nope. Alastair Crooke, in a fascinating discussion this morning, explains that any such missiles were long ago removed from those locations:

Western Propaganda Wars

Yesterday, Hezbollah was totally up front about their targets:

The Glilot base is 110 km from the Lebanese border and 1,500 meters from Tel Aviv's periphery

We targeted the Glilot base, which is a main base affiliated with the Aman military intelligence and to which Unit 8200 belongs."

[Unit 8200 is an Israeli Intelligence Corps unit of the Israel Defense Forces responsible for clandestine operation, collecting signal intelligence (SIGINT) and code decryption, counterintelligence, cyberwarfare, military intelligence, and surveillance. Military publications include references to Unit 8200 as the Central Collection Unit of the Intelligence Corps, and it is sometimes referred to as Israeli SIGINT National Unit (ISNU). It is subordinate to Aman, the military intelligence directorate.]

Israel maintained that those targets suffered “no damage” and took “no hits”. Hezbollah, however, has issued a statement that claims hits. Tellingly, Hezbollah references something that I heard after publishing yesterday: the gag order that Netanyahu slapped on Israeli media, forbidding any references damage to national security locations. A gag order quickly slapped on media seems to be a definite admission that Hezbollah did, in fact, hit its designated targets. It also tends to give the lie to the Israeli claim that it destroyed “thousands” of missiles and launchers. Larry Johnson provides the quote from the Hezbollah statement—IS ISRAEL COMMITTING NATIONAL SUICIDE?

Hezbollah claims that it did not use any of its more advanced weaponry, which includes strategic and precision ballistic missiles. Hezbollah’s leader, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah described the Hezbollah attack as follows:

“In today’s operation, for the first time, we launched a drone from the Bekaa region, and despite the long distance, it crossed into the occupied Palestinian territories. All the drones launched from the Bekaa crossed the Lebanese-Palestinian border safely towards the specified targets.

“No launch platform was hit before the operation, and no drone launch sites were damaged either before or after the operation.

“The specific military targets were the Aman military intelligence base and Unit 8200 in ‘Glilot’, and the other target was the air defense base in ‘Ein Shemer’.

“Our data confirms that a significant number of drones reached these targets, but the enemy is concealing (https://t.me/Cultures_of_Resistance/33939) the facts. However, the coming days and nights will reveal the truth of what happened there.

“We identified a set of targets near ‘Tel Aviv’ that meet our specifications, including the ‘Glilot’ base, which is a central base for ‘Israeli’ intelligence and houses Unit 8200.

In short, Hezbollah launched a targeted attack against a sensitive Israeli military base. Think of Glilot as the Israeli version of the US National Security Agency.

With regard to the weaponry used, it appears that Hezbollah used Katyusha rockets as decoys, with drones comprising the actual strike complement. Again, this gives the lie to the Israeli claim that Hezbollah was driving around a 5 km strip along the Lebanon border with “thousands” of ballistic missiles.

In fact, Crooke mentions something that I noticed while watching Israeli Gen. Gallant. Gallant appeared quite subdued. The drones are unlikely to have caused anything like the damage that cruise or ballistic missiles would cause. What the Hezbollah strike looks like is a statement, not unlike Iran’s ballistic missile strike that hit Israel’s most sensitive air force base. Hezbollah’s statement would be that, Yes, we can reach out an hit you and your air defense can’t stop us. Moreover, we have much more and more effective stuff where those little drones came from. That would come as a follow up to Hezbollah’s video showing their remarkable underground infrastructure last week. That, too, appeared to be a warning: Don’t think you can do a first strike and avoid our missile forces. I suspect that Gallant’s subdued demeanor suggests that he got the messages.

Where this is heading is matter for speculation rather than prediction. Last week we mentioned an op-ed piece that former Israeli General Itzhak Brik published in Haaretz, in which he maintained that Israel cannot last more than a year, max, if the current war of attrition continues. Larry Johnson (link above) provides a further excerpt from that article. Note the pointed reference to Gallant, whose subdued demeanor after the Hezbollah strike I described above. My guess is that Brik’s views do, in fact, reflect those of the top military command. These guys aren’t humanitarians—the Israeli military has been engaged in one huge, continuing war crime since last October. But they’re not stupid. They can read the handwriting on the wall. They see that something like half the US Navy is in the region now, but they also see that the Houthis have effectively defeated that navy in the Red Sea. Brik likens Netanyahu to Samson, pulling down the Philistine temple on his own head—with the difference that the people in the temple here are Israelis.

I assume that Defense Minister Gallant already understands that the war has lost its purpose. Israel is sinking deeper into the Gazan mud, losing more and more soldiers as they get killed or wounded, without any chance of achieving the war’s main goal: bringing down Hamas.

The country really is galloping towards the edge of an abyss. If the war of attrition against Hamas and Hezbollah continues, Israel will collapse within no more than a year. . . .

Netanyahu decided to “die with the Philistines” – in this case, the citizens of Israel – only to retain his power.

He has lost his humanity, basic morality, norms, values, and responsibility for Israel’s security. Only replacing him and his cronies as soon as possible can save the country. Israel has entered an existential tailspin and could soon reach a point of no return.

In his discussion with Judge Nap, Crooke warns that continued happy talk from Netanyahu are very dangerous. Those Israelis—and Americans—who take the notion that Israel is somehow on the road to victory are buying into a delusion that could lead to the regional war that Netanyahu and the other crazies so desperately want. Most Israelis, living out their Zionist psychosis, have no conception of what that will actually mean. The US military should know and should be conducting an intervention against the Netanyahu government, in the interests of everyone in the region, including Israelis. But don’t hold your breath.