Rantburg

Today's Front Page   View All of Wed 05/28/2025 View Tue 05/27/2025 View Mon 05/26/2025 View Sun 05/25/2025 View Sat 05/24/2025 View Fri 05/23/2025 View Thu 05/22/2025
2024-10-20 Syria-Lebanon-Iran
IDF destroys major tunnel of elite Hezbollah force as it tackles underground network
[IsraelTimes] The military is working to systematically demolish the web of shafts it says would be used in an Oct. 7-style attack on the north

A tunnel in southern Leb
...an Iranian satrapy until recently ruled by Hassan Nasrallah situated on the eastern Mediterranean, conveniently adjacent to Israel. Formerly inhabited by hardy Phoenecian traders, its official language is now Arabic, with the usual unpleasant side effects. The Leb civil war, between 1975 and 1990, lasted a little over 145 years and produced 120,000 fatalities. The average length of a ceasefire was measured in seconds. The Lebs maintain a precarious sectarian balance among Shiites, Sunnis, and about a dozen flavors of Christians, plus Armenians, Georgians, and who knows what else? It is the home of the original Hezbollah, which periodically starts a war with the Zionist Entity, gets Beirut pounded to rubble, and then declares victory and has a parade. The Lebs have the curious habit of periodically murdering their heads of state or prime ministers...
belonging to Hezbollah’s elite Radwan Force was recently demolished by combat engineers, the IDF said Saturday. The military described the underground passage as one of Radwan’s central tunnels in Lebanon, which included a command center, a weapons depot, rooms to reside in, scooter bikes, and other equipment. Next to the tunnel, the IDF said troops also located dozens of weapons and equipment belonging to Hezbollah.

Additionally, more than 50 other tunnel shafts and three other major tunnels were demolished by combat engineers under the 91st Division in southern Lebanon, the IDF said. According to the IDF, more than 100 tons of explosives were used to demolish the four tunnels.

Israeli forces have spent much of the past year destroying Hamas
..a contraction of the Arabic words for "frothing at the mouth",...
’s vast underground network in Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with a rusty iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about oppression and disproportionate response...
. They are now focused on dismantling tunnels and other hideouts belonging to Hezbollah in southern Lebanon.

Scarred by Hamas’s deadly massacre into Israel last year that sparked the war in Gaza, Israel says it aims to prevent similar atrocities across its northern border from ever being carried out.

The military has combed through the dense brush of southern Lebanon for the past two weeks, uncovering what it says are Hezbollah’s deep attack capabilities — highlighted by a tunnel system equipped with weapons caches and rocket launchers that pose a direct threat to nearby communities.

Israel’s war against the Iran-backed terror group stretches far inside Lebanon, and its Arclight airstrike
...KABOOM!...
s in recent weeks have killed more than 1,700 people, about a quarter of whom were women and kiddies, according to local health authorities. The IDF estimates that more than 1,500 Hezbollah operatives have been killed in the conflict so far.

But its ground campaign has centered on a narrow patch of land just along the border, where Hezbollah has had a longstanding presence, in violation of UN resolutions.

HEZBOLLAH HAS DEEP TIES TO SOUTHERN LEBANON
Hezbollah, which seeks Israel’s destruction, is the Arab world’s most significant paramilitary force. It began firing rockets into Israel a day after Hamas’s devastating onslaught on October 7, 2023. After nearly a year of tit-for-tat fighting with Hezbollah, and warnings it would not tolerate the terror group’s continued presence on the border, Israel launched its ground invasion into southern Lebanon on October 1 and has since sent thousands of troops into the rugged terrain.

Even as it continues to bolster its forces, Israel says its invasion consists of "limited, localized and targeted ground raids" that are meant to destroy Hezbollah infrastructure, so that tens of thousands of displaced Israelis can return home. The fighting also has uprooted more than 1 million Lebanese in the past month.

Many residents of southern Lebanon are supporters of the group and benefit from its social outreach. Though most fled the area months ago, they widely see the heavily armed Hezbollah as their defender.

That broad support has allowed Hezbollah to establish "a military infrastructure for itself" within the villages, said Eva J. Koulouriotis, a political analyst specializing in the Middle East and Islamic terror groups. The military says it has found weapons within homes and buildings in the villages.

A LAND OF TUNNELS
With Israel’s air power far outstripping Hezbollah’s defenses, the terror group has turned to underground tunnels as a way to elude Israeli drones and jets and prepare its attacks against Israeli communities. Experts say Hezbollah’s tunnels are not limited to the south.

"It’s a land of tunnels," said Tal Beeri, who studies Hezbollah as director of research at the Alma Research and Education Center, a think tank with a focus on northern Israel’s security.

Koulouriotis said tunnels stretch under the southern suburbs of Beirut, where Hezbollah’s command and control are located and where it keeps a stockpile of strategic missiles. She said the group also maintains tunnels along the border with Syria, through which it smuggles weapons and other supplies from Iran
...a theocratic Shiite state divided among the Medes, the Persians, and the (Arab) Elamites. Formerly a fairly civilized nation ruled by a Shah, it became a victim of Islamic revolution in 1979. The nation is today noted for spontaneously taking over other countries' embassies, maintaining whorehouses run by clergymen, involvement in international drug trafficking, and financing sock puppet militias to extend the regime's influence. The word Iran is a cognate form of Aryan. The abbreviation IRGC is the same idea as Stürmabteilung (or SA). The term Supreme Guide is a the modern version form of either Duce or Führer or maybe both. They hate Jews Zionists Jews. Their economy is based on the production of oil and vitriol...
into Lebanon.

Southern Lebanon is where Hezbollah maintains tunnels to store missiles — and from where it can launch them, Koulouriotis said. Some of the more than 50 Israelis killed by Hezbollah over the past year were hit by anti-tank missiles.

In contrast to the tunnels dug out by Hamas in the sandy coastal terrain of Gaza, Hezbollah’s tunnels in southern Lebanon were carved into solid rock, a feat that likely required time, money, machinery, and expertise.

An Israeli military official said that using prior intelligence, Israel had found "hundreds and hundreds and hundreds" of underground positions, many of which could hold about 10 operatives and were stocked with rations. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity in line with military rules, said troops were blowing up the tunnels or using cement to make them unusable.

The group used tunnels during the monthlong 2006 Second Lebanon War, but the network has been expanded since, defying a United Nations
...the Oyster Bay money pit...
ceasefire resolution that compelled Lebanese and UN forces to keep Hezbollah out of the south.

In mid-August, Hezbollah released a video showing what appeared to be a cavernous underground tunnel large enough for trucks loaded with missiles to drive through. Hezbollah operatives were also seen riding cycle of violences inside the illuminated tunnel, named Imad-4 after the group’s late military commander, Imad Mughniyeh, who was killed in Syria in 2008 in a kaboom blamed on Israel.

HEZBOLLAH’S TUNNELS COULD BE HINDERING ISRAEL’S MISSION
Israeli troops are pushing through southern Lebanon using tanks and engineering equipment, and air and ground forces have struck thousands of targets in the area since the invasion began.

The military recently said it found one cross-border tunnel that stretched just a few meters into Israel but did not have an opening. Israel also exposed a tunnel shaft that was located about 100 meters from a UN peacekeepers ’ post, although it wasn’t clear what the precise purpose of that tunnel was.

Israel says the tunnels are stocked with supplies and weapons and are outfitted with lighting, ventilation, and sometimes plumbing, indicating they could be used for long stays. It says it has arrested several Hezbollah terror operatives hiding inside, including three on Tuesday who were found armed. The Israeli military official said many Hezbollah operatives appear to have withdrawn from the area.

Lebanese military expert Naji Malaeb, a retired brigadier general, asserted that Hezbollah’s tunnels were preventing Israel from making major gains. He compared that achievement to the war in Gaza, where Hamas has used its tunnels to bedevil Israeli forces and stage insurgency-like attacks. Nevertheless, Israel has managed to largely dismantle Hamas’s fighting capabilities in Gaza.

Israeli authorities insist the mission in Lebanon is succeeding. The military assesses it has killed hundreds of Hezbollah operatives in the ground operation (and a total of 1,500 in the conflict), while 17 Israeli soldiers have been killed during that time.

Israel has encountered Hezbollah’s tunnels before. In 2018, Israel launched an operation to destroy attack tunnels that crossed into Israeli territory. Beeri said that six tunnels were discovered, including one that was 1 kilometer (1,000 yards) long and 80 meters (87 yards) deep, crossing some 50 meters into Israel.

AN OCTOBER 7-STYLE INVASION
For Israel, the tunnels are evidence that Hezbollah planned what it says would be a bloody offensive against communities in the north.

"Hezbollah has openly declared that it plans to carry out its own October 7 massacre on Israel’s northern border, on an even larger scale," IDF front man Rear. Adm. Daniel Hagari said the day troops entered Lebanon.

Former Hezbollah leader His Eminence Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah
...The late, lamented satrap of the Medes and the Persians in Leb...>
, who was killed by Israel last month while in an underground bunker, had signaled in speeches that Hezbollah could launch an attack on northern Israel.

In May 2023, just months before Hamas’s massacre, Hezbollah staged a simulation of an incursion into northern Israel with rifle-toting gunnies on cycle of violences bursting through a mock border fence bedecked with Israeli flags.

Related: Another Times of Israel article has video of what more than 100 tons of explosives looks like when blowing up a Hezbollah’s elite Radwan Force tunnel in south Lebanon.
Posted by trailing wife 2024-10-20 2024-10-20 02:34|| || Front Page|| [11310 views ]  Top
 File under: Hezbollah 

14:34 Frank G
14:28 Melancholic
14:27 NoMoreBS
14:14 swksvolFF
14:12 swksvolFF
13:54 mossomo
13:51 mossomo
13:50 NoMoreBS
13:50 Abu Uluque
13:44 Abu Uluque
13:41 NoMoreBS
13:39 Abu Uluque
13:36 mossomo
13:36 swksvolFF
13:32 mossomo
13:26 Frank G
13:12 Regular joe
13:12 mossomo
13:11 swksvolFF
13:08 Abu Uluque
13:00 swksvolFF
12:59 Regular joe
12:55 Skidmark
12:53 Skidmark









Paypal:
Google
Search WWW Search rantburg.com