Analysis

Nasrallah killing reveals depth of Israeli penetration of Hezbollah

Friday’s targeting of terror chief is culmination of string of attacks against organization’s top echelon, key weapons caches, based on decades of Israeli intelligence gathering

A man points to a television set displaying an image of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah with a black stripe for mourning during a broadcast from the private Lebanese station NBN in Beirut on September 28, 2024. (JOSEPH EID / AFP)
A man points to a television set displaying an image of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah with a black stripe for mourning during a broadcast from the private Lebanese station NBN in Beirut on September 28, 2024. (JOSEPH EID / AFP)

In the wake of Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah’s killing, the terror group faces the enormous challenge of plugging the infiltration in its ranks that allowed Israel to destroy its weapons sites, reportedly booby-trap its communications, and assassinate its veteran leader, whose whereabouts had been a closely guarded secret for years.

Nasrallah’s killing in a command HQ on Friday came barely a week after the deadly detonation of thousands of booby-trapped pagers and radios widely attributed to Israel. It was the culmination of a rapid succession of strikes that have eliminated half of Hezbollah’s leadership council and decimated its top military command.

In the days before and hours after Nasrallah’s killing, Reuters spoke to more than a dozen sources in Lebanon, Israel, Iran and Syria who provided details of the damage Israel has wrought on the powerful Shiite terror group, including to its supply lines and command structure. All asked for anonymity to speak about sensitive matters.

One source familiar with Israeli thinking told Reuters, less than 24 hours before the strike, that Israel had spent 20 years focusing intelligence efforts on Hezbollah and could hit Nasrallah when it wanted, including in the headquarters.

The person called the intelligence “brilliant,” without providing details.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his close circle of ministers authorized the attack on Wednesday, two Israeli officials said. The attack took place while Netanyahu was in New York to speak at the UN General Assembly.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu hold signs as he addresses the 79th session of the UN General Assembly, September 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Pamela Smith)

Nasrallah had avoided public appearances since the 2006 Second Lebanon War. He had long been vigilant, his movements were restricted and the circle of people he saw was very small, according to a source familiar with his security arrangements. The killing suggested his group had been infiltrated by informants for Israel, the source said.

The Hezbollah leader had been even more cautious since the September 17 pager blasts, out of concern Israel would try to kill him, a security source familiar with the group’s thinking told Reuters a week ago, citing his absence from a commander’s funeral and his pre-recording of a speech broadcast a few days before.

Hezbollah’s media office did not respond to a request for comment for this story. US President Joe Biden on Saturday called Nasrallah’s killing “a measure of justice” for his many victims, and said Washington fully supported Israel’s right to defend itself against Iranian-backed groups.

Israel says it carried out the hit on Nasrallah with dozens of bunker-busting bombs dropped by Israeli Air Force fighter jets on Hezbollah’s underground headquarters below a residential building in southern Beirut.

“This is a massive blow and intelligence failure for Hezbollah,” said Magnus Ranstorp, a veteran Hezbollah expert at the Swedish Defence University. “They knew that he was meeting. He was meeting with other commanders. And they just went for him.”

Including Nasrallah, the Israel Defense Forces says it has killed eight of Hezbollah’s nine most senior military commanders this year, mostly in the past week. These commanders led units ranging from the rocket division to the elite Radwan force, which Israel has said had long been preparing a massive invasion of northern Israel.

People gather outside the American University hospital after the arrival of several men who were wounded by exploded handheld pagers, in an attack on Hezbollah fighters blamed on Israel, in Beirut, Lebanon, September 17, 2024. (AP Photo/Bassam Masri)

Over 35 Hezbollah fighters were killed and around 1,500 maimed by the exploding pagers and walkie-talkies on September 17 and September 18.

On Saturday, IDF spokesperson Lieutenant Colonel Nadav Shoshani told reporters in a briefing that the military had “real-time” knowledge that Nasrallah and other commanders were gathering. Shoshani did not say how they knew, but said the commanders were meeting to plan attacks on Israel.

Brigadier General Amichai Levin, commander of the IAF’s Hatzerim Airbase, told reporters that dozens of munitions hit the target within seconds.

“The operation was complex and had been planned for a long time,” according to Levin.

Depleted

Hezbollah has shown its ability to replace commanders quickly, and Nasrallah’s cousin Hashem Safieddine, also a cleric who wears the black turban denoting descent from Islam’s Prophet Mohammed, has long been tipped as his successor.

“You kill one, they get a new one,” said a European diplomat of the terror group’s approach.

Hezbollah military commander Ibrahim Aqil (left) with senior Hezbollah official Hashem Safieddine in an undated photo released by the terror group on September 21, 2024. (Hezbollah media office)

The terror group, whose name means Party of God, will fight on: By US and Israeli estimates it had some 40,000 fighters ahead of the current escalation, along with large weapons stockpiles and an extensive tunnel network near Israel’s border.

Founded in Tehran in 1982, the Shiite terror group is the most formidable member of Iran’s so-called Axis of Resistance of anti-Israel and anti-US allied terror groups, and a significant regional player in its own right.

But it has been materially and psychologically weakened over the past 10 days.

Thanks to decades of backing from Iran, prior to the current conflict Hezbollah had an arsenal of 150,000 rockets, missiles and drones, according to US estimates.

That is ten times the size of the armory the terror group had in 2006, during its last war with Israel, according to Israeli estimates.

Over the past year, even more weapons have flowed into Lebanon from Iran, along with significant amounts of financial aid, a source familiar with Hezbollah’s thinking said.

Demonstrators gather for an anti-Israel protest in Tehran’s Palestine Square on September 28, 2024, after the Iran-backed Lebanese Hezbollah group confirmed reports of the killing of its leader Hassan Nasrallah in an Israeli air strike in Beirut the previous day. (ATTA KENARE / AFP)

There have been few detailed public assessments of how much this arsenal has been damaged by Israel’s offensive over the past week, which has hit Hezbollah strongholds in Beqaa Valley, far from Lebanon’s border with Israel.

One Western diplomat in the Middle East told Reuters prior to Friday’s attack that Hezbollah had lost 20-25 percent of its missile capacity in the ongoing conflict, including in hundreds of Israeli strikes this week. The diplomat did not provide evidence or details of their assessment.

An Israeli security official said “a very respectable portion” of Hezbollah’s missile stocks had been destroyed, without giving further specifics.

In recent days, Israel has struck more than 1,000 Hezbollah targets. The security official, when asked about the military’s extensive target lists, said Israel had matched Hezbollah’s two-decade build-up with preparations to prevent it launching its rockets in the first place — a complement to the Iron Dome air defense system that often downs missiles fired at the Jewish state.

Israeli officials say the fact that Hezbollah has only been able to launch a couple of hundred missiles a day in the past week was evidence its capabilities had been diminished.

Iran connection

Before the strike on Nasrallah, three Iranian sources had told Reuters Iran was planning to send additional missiles to Hezbollah to prepare for a prolonged war.

The weapons that were to be provided included short-to-medium-range ballistic missiles, including Iranian Zelzals and an upgraded precision version known as the Fateh 110, the first Iranian source said.

An Iranian military truck carries parts of a Sayad 4-B missile past a portrait of supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei during a military parade as part of a ceremony marking the country’s annual army day in Tehran on April 17, 2024. (Atta Kenare / AFP)

Reuters was unable to reach the sources after the Nasrallah assassination.

While Iran is willing to provide military support, the two Iranian sources said it does not want to be directly involved in a confrontation between Hezbollah and Israel. The rapid escalation in hostilities over the past week follows a year of skirmishes tied to the Gaza war.

Iranian Revolutionary Guards deputy commander Abbas Nilforoushan was killed in the Israeli strikes on Beirut on Friday, Iranian media reported on Saturday, citing a state TV report.

Hezbollah may need certain warheads and missiles along with drones and missile parts to replenish those destroyed by Israeli strikes across Lebanon last week, a senior Syrian military intelligence source added.

Iranian supplies have in the past reached Hezbollah by air and sea. On Saturday, Lebanon’s transport ministry told an Iranian aircraft not to enter its airspace after Israel warned air traffic control at Beirut airport that it would use “force” if the plane landed, a source at the ministry told Reuters.

The source said it was not clear what was on the plane.

An F-15I fighter jet of the IAF’s 69th Squadron takes off from the Hatzerim Airbase in southern Israel to carry out a strike in Beirut against Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah, September 27, 2024. (Israel Defense Forces)

Land corridors are currently the best route for missiles, parts and drones, through Iraq and Syria, with the help of allied terror groups in those countries, an Iranian security official told Reuters this week.

The Syrian military source, however, said Israeli drone surveillance and strikes targeting convoys of trucks had compromised that route. This year, Israel stepped up attacks on weapons depots and supply routes in Syria to weaken Hezbollah ahead of any war, Reuters reported in June.

As recently as August, an Israeli drone hit weapons concealed in commercial trailers in Syria, the source said. This week, Israel’s military said its warplanes bombed unspecified infrastructure used to transfer weapons to Hezbollah at the Syria-Lebanon border.

Joseph Votel, a former army general who led US forces in the Middle East, said Israel and its allies could well intercept any missiles Iran sent by land to Hezbollah now.

“That might be a risk they’re willing to take, frankly,” he said.

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