Israel fears Hezbollah’s advanced drones

In mid-May, Hezbollah shot down Sky Dew, one of Israel’s most important tools for monitoring the airspace in the north and enabling the country’s air defenses to shoot down rockets from Lebanon.

The large balloon was high in the air above an Israeli military base, 35 kilometers from the border. It was hit by a target-guided Ababil attack drone.

Israel confirmed the incident, which illustrated the new threat the country is facing. Israel has developed advanced air defense systems such as Iron Dome and David’s Sling to protect against rockets, but these are less suitable for stopping drones.

– Hezbollah’s drone capacity is a threat that must be taken seriously, says Fabian Hinz of the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) think tank.

More and more precise

The Hezbollah militia has recently also put a strain on Israeli leaders by sending surveillance drones to survey military installations and other strategically important targets in Israel.

One such drone filmed, among other things, the Israeli airbase Ramat David, something that only became known when Hezbollah made the images public.

The shooting down of Sky Dew also showed how precise the militia’s attack drones are now.

– This attack shows how they have increased accuracy and the ability to avoid Israeli air defenses, concludes a report prepared by the Israeli think tank Institute for National Security Studies.

Monitors and attacks

Since the Hamas attack on southern Israel in October, and Israel’s subsequent warfare in the Gaza Strip, there have been almost daily skirmishes in the border area between Lebanon and Israel.

Hezbollah has repeatedly attacked Israeli military posts both along the border and deep inside the country.

Israeli air defenses have intercepted hundreds of drones, but far from all.

In April, an Israeli soldier was killed and 13 soldiers and four civilians were wounded in a drone attack against Arab al-Aramsheh in the north of Israel.

Earlier this month, six people were injured in a drone attack on the town of Nahariya, about a mile south of the border.

Produces own drones

The leader of the Hezbollah movement, Hassan Nasrallah, claims that the militia now produces its own drones, but so far they have mostly used Iranian-made ones of the Ababil and Shahed type.

However, the militia acquires parts for its own drone production from Western countries.

In July, three people were arrested in Spain and one in Germany, suspected of belonging to a network that supplied Hezbollah with drone parts.

Hezbollah has also on at least one occasion used a drone that fired target-guided Russian-made missiles of the S5 type.

Killed by Israel

Hezbollah’s use of drones is not new, but goes all the way back to the beginning of the 2000s.

In 2004, they sent the first surveillance drone across the border to Israel, an Iranian-made drone of the Mirsad type.

Two years later, Hassan Lakkis took over responsibility for the militia’s program and made sure to make the drones increasingly advanced. He was killed in an Israeli assassination attempt in 2013.

Several other drone experts have also been killed in Lebanon and Syria, some of them Iranian.

Attack gas platform

When Hezbollah moved into Syria to assist President Bashar al-Assad in the war against rebels, the drone program really took off.

Both the attack and surveillance drones became increasingly advanced, which they demonstrated when they recently broadcast three surveillance drones over Israel’s largest gas installations on the Karish field in the Mediterranean.

All three drones were shot down, but the attack was a wake-up call for Israel.

Formidable arsenal

Israel has never been able to defeat Hezbollah, neither during the 15-year occupation of southern Lebanon that ended in 2000, nor in the years since.

During the 34-day war in 2006, it rained 4000 rockets over Israel. 165 Israelis were killed, just over 120 of them soldiers.

At the time, most of the rockets were imprecise Katyusha rockets with explosive charges of less than 30 kilograms and a range of just under 30 kilometers, but the Israeli Navy’s flagship Hanit was hit by a far more advanced Chinese-developed C-802 rocket.

Israeli intelligence suspected that Hezbollah was in possession of such rockets, and today there is no doubt that the militia has far more and more advanced weapons in its arsenal.

200,000 rockets

The US Military Intelligence Agency (DIA) estimated in 2019 that Hezbollah was in possession of 150,000 rockets, and Israeli ones Institute for National Security Studies (INSS) believe that today there may be up to 200,000 rockets.

Scud missiles with a range of over 500 kilometers is hidden in underground facilities in northern Lebanon, and Hezbollah also has the Iranian-made The Fateh rockets. These are satellite-guided, have a range of 300 kilometers and can be fired from mobile ramps.

Both of these rocket systems can thus hit targets all over Israel, and with a great degree of precision.

Hezbollah is also said to have secured more advanced missiles for use against naval targets, probably Russian Yakhont missiles with a range of up to 300 kilometers.

Laser guided

Hezbollah also has large quantities of armor-piercing rockets, which the Israeli forces noticed in 2006.

Over 50 Israeli Merkava tanks were destroyed during that war, and today the Lebanese militia is far better equipped in this area as well.

Laser-guided and heat-seeking anti-tank missiles of the type AT-14 can hit targets up to 5 kilometers away and will be highly effective against Israeli ground forces.

Air defense

Hezbollah also has far better air defenses than before. Among other things, the militia has the Russian-developed Pantsir system, which consists of both artillery guns and heat-seeking surface-to-air missiles.

Experts also believe they have upgraded AA-10 homing missiles of the same type that the Houthi militia in Yemen used when they shot down a large American MQ-9 drone.

To deter Israel and emphasize its own strength, Hezbollah announced last week in propaganda-video which showed an extensive tunnel system. In the video, you could also see a large rocket battery, trucks, motorcycles and soldiers inside the tunnels.

– Our mountains are our arsenals, read the title of the video.