Rattling sabers, IDF drills for long-range strike as Hezbollah touts advanced missiles

Threatening messages come amid ongoing fighting along border with Lebanon, including surveillance drone thought to belong to terror group crashing in northern town

Emanuel (Mannie) Fabian is The Times of Israel's military correspondent

An IAF Boeing 707 refueling plane and several F-35 and F-15 fighter jets carry out a drill just off the coast of Israel, August 15, 2024. (Israel Defense Forces)
An IAF Boeing 707 refueling plane and several F-35 and F-15 fighter jets carry out a drill just off the coast of Israel, August 15, 2024. (Israel Defense Forces)

Israeli jets recently practiced mid-air refueling to prepare for long-range sorties, the military announced Friday in what was seen as a stark warning to Iran, as the Hezbollah terror group in Lebanon sought to flex its own muscle by showing off an underground silo for precision missiles.

The region has been bracing for a major escalation in violence for more than two weeks, since Israel killed Hezbollah’s military chief Fuad Shukr and was blamed for the assassination of Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran, drawing promises to retaliate from both Iran and its Lebanese proxy.

Israel has been on high alert and has warned that it would respond if Iran or Hezbollah attack, even as low-level clashes with the Lebanese group continued Friday along Israel’s northern border.

The Israeli Air Force’s drill on Thursday “simulated a long-range flight deep in enemy territory, while conducting aerial refueling several times in short periods,” the IDF said, in an apparent reference to a potential strike in Iran or deep in Lebanon. Both strikes would likely involve the use of air-to-air refuelers.

The drill was carried out over Israeli airspace and involved one of the IAF’s Boeing 707 refueling planes, and several F-35i and F-15 fighter jets.

Meeting with British and French counterparts Friday, Foreign Minister Israel Katz said he was seeking a commitment from US allies to join in retaliatory military action against Iran should it strike Israel.

In Lebanon, Iran’s proxy Hezbollah published a video showing an underground missile facility it called Imad 4, with the group’s leader Hassan Nasrallah boasting about the terror group’s armed capabilities.

The highly edited video showed missiles being moved around on trucks inside the underground facility and launching positions for the projectiles.

A Hezbollah official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was speaking about military affairs, said the missiles in the video have a range of about 140 kilometers (86 miles), capable of reaching deep inside Israel.

According to Israeli military assessments, Hezbollah maintains an arsenal of some 150,000 projectiles of various varieties and ranges, from mortar shells to simple rockets with ranges of 200 kilometers (120 miles) to cruise missiles, shore-to-sea missiles and explosive-laden drones.

The group is also believed to have a small number of precision-guided missiles, despite intensive efforts by the IDF to thwart Iranian attempts to arm the organization.

Friday saw several drones and at least one rocket fired by Hezbollah at Israel, including an apparent Hezbollah surveillance drone that crashed in the northern town of Beit Jann in the morning. The IDF said it was investigating the incident. Later that day, two suspected drones were launched from Lebanon at northern Israel, setting off sirens in the Golan Heights area.

The IDF said that one of the suspected drones was shot down by air defenses, and the second struck near the northern community of Kela. A fire also sparked in the area as a result of falling shrapnel following the interception.

In another incident on Friday, the IDF said an interceptor missile was fired at a suspected drone that entered Israeli airspace from Lebanon, setting off sirens in the Galilee Panhandle. The military did not say if the target was shot down.

Separately, a rocket fired from Lebanon struck an open area near the border community of Netu’a, the IDF said.

There were no injuries in any of the attacks.

The terror group claimed seven separate attacks on Israel throughout the day.

The IDF said its fighter jets carried out strikes on buildings used by Hezbollah in the southern Lebanese towns of Maroun al-Ras, Ayta ash-Shab, and Kafr Kila.

In Aitaroun, a group of Hezbollah operatives spotted at a building used by the terror group were targeted in a drone strike, the army said.

Since October 8, Hezbollah-led forces have attacked Israeli communities and military posts along the border on a near-daily basis, with the group saying it is doing so to support Gaza amid the war there.

So far, the skirmishes have resulted in 26 civilian deaths on the Israeli side, as well as the deaths of 18 IDF soldiers and reservists. There have also been several attacks from Syria, without any injuries.

Hezbollah said one of its fighters was killed Friday, bringing the number of operatives killed by Israel since fighting started in October to 411. Another 71 operatives from other terror groups, a Lebanese soldier, and dozens of civilians have also been killed.

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