Israel Targets Hezbollah Terror Network Hidden in Civilian Areas, Warns of New Strikes

Jerusalem, 23 September, 2024 (TPS) -- Israel warned residents of southern Lebanon to flee homes used by Hezbollah to store weapons while releasing a video of a strike on a home containing a cruise missile on Monday. Experts told The Press Service of Israel that Hezbollah’s network of military infrastructure in southern Lebanon is both extensive and deliberate.

“I have recorded a clear message for all residents of Southern Lebanon—in the past few hours, we identified an intention to attack Israel, and soon we will strike,” said Israel Defense Forces Spokesperson Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari.

“For more than 20 years, Hezbollah has placed weapons inside homes and armed them, turning southern Lebanon into a combat zone. We are monitoring this activity, locating the weapons and destroying them in precise strikes. We urge you to move away from them immediately, for your safety. Hezbollah is endangering you,” Hagari added.

Hagari disclosed that Hezbollah was preparing to launch a cruise missile hidden inside a civilian home, but the building was blown up in a pre-emptive airstrike.

Video footage released by the army showed a terrorist opening an exterior wall, revealing a missile. According to the IDF, the missile was a DR-3 cruise missile, which is Russian-made. The DR-3 carries a 300 kilo warhead and has a range of up to 200 km.

“The terrorists create a designated opening for the missile launch. Here you can see how we identified the terrorists making an opening in the building that exposed the missile. In a precise strike, the IDF eliminated the terrorists and this missile launching infrastructure, shortly before the launch,” Hagari explained.

“Shortly, the IDF will engage in extensive, precise strikes, against terror targets which have been embedded widely throughout Lebanon,” he added.

Sarit Zahavi, president and founder of the Alma Research Center, told The Press Service of Israel in August that Hezbollah doctrine make extensive use of civilian homes.

“Hezbollah stores their weapons everywhere, both between villages and within the villages themselves,” she said.

“By and large, every third house in the Shi’ite villages of south Lebanon is used in some way by Hezbollah for military purposes, be it weapons storage, the entrance of a tunnel, or a launchpad for shooting rockets at Israel,” she explained.

According to Yifa Segal, an international law expert from the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security, Hezbollah’s goal is “to ensure that any Israeli response will result in as much collateral damage as possible so that Hezbollah can say that it was a war crime,” she told TPS-IL in August.

“Firing from populated civilian areas, which is in and of itself illegal in the eyes of international law, transforms those areas into legitimate military targets,” Segal said.

According to the Alma Center’s research, Hezbollah’s command is primarily embedded in Beirut while much of its logistical facilities are in the communities of eastern Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley.

Thus, rocket launchers, weapons stockpiles, munition factories, command and control centers, tunnel shafts, observation posts and other terror infrastructure are located in and around homes, schools, hospitals and mosques throughout Lebanon.

In addition, the Alma Center shared with The Press Service of Israel a collection of videos since October filmed by Lebanese citizens showing Hezbollah firing rockets from inside residential buildings in various villages.

Tensions between Israel and Hezbollah have soared in recent days.

On Tuesday, pagers belonging to Hezbollah operatives exploded across Lebanon and in Syria, injuring thousands. More Hezbollah figures were injured in a second wave of explosions on Wednesday. The Iran-backed terror group said 32 of its people were killed, a number that has not been independently verified. Israeli officials believe the death toll is higher than Hezbollah has indicated. The blasts are widely attributed to Israel, but Jerusalem has not commented.

An Israeli airstrike in Beirut on Friday killed 16 senior terrorists, eliminating most of the elite Radwan Force’s chain of command.

Northern residents were forced to evacuate their homes when Hezbollah began launching rockets and drones in October. The terror group has launched more than 6,700 rockets and drones, killing 26 civilians and 22 soldiers on the Israeli side.

Hezbollah leaders have said they will continue the attacks to prevent Israelis from returning to their homes, which Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah reiterated in a speech on Thursday night.

Israeli officials have been calling for Hezbollah to be disarmed and removed from southern Lebanon in compliance with UN Security Council resolution 1701, which ended the 2006 Second Lebanon War.