Beirut- Since the assassination of the Deputy Head of the Political Bureau of the Islamic Resistance Movement “Hamas”, Saleh Al-Arouri, on the evening of January 2, a question has arisen about Israel’s resort to the policy of assassinations, as a tool with which it excels in intelligence and security, in search of a victory that it has not achieved since the outbreak of Operation “Al-Aqsa Flood.” .
While the occupation soldiers were unable, amidst the rubble of Gaza, to “end Hamas” as their government promised, they were also unable to deter Hezbollah on their northern front, despite their constant threats to launch a wide-scale war on Lebanon. Then came the assassination of Hezbollah’s leader and the official in the “Radwan” unit, Wissam Al-Taweel, On January 8, to confirm that Israel, with its “existential” war, took its path with assassinations, as a war parallel to its failures.
With the two assassinations of Al-Arouri and Al-Tawil on Lebanese soil, Israel broke the rules of engagement with Hezbollah, by striking Hamas deep in the southern suburbs of Beirut, the party’s security, political and popular incubator, and responded to its strikes by assassinating the most prominent leaders and engineers of its field operations, in his town, Khirbet Selm. South Lebanon.
Attempt to deter
There are those who believe that Israel’s strength lies in the weakness of the resistance axis, which is represented by assassination operations using intelligence and espionage tools, as its allies support it logistically, technically, and with satellites. Moreover, Israel has not yet received a response of the same type of action to most of its assassinations of leaders and officials of the resistance movements. .
However, observers call for reading history, because Israel’s intelligence superiority has never helped it win its wars. All the assassinations did not discourage the resistance movements from escalating, growing, and breaking Israel militarily.
Then came the events of October 7 and what followed them, removing doubt with certainty, as analysts link this to the doctrine and approach of the resistance, whose leaders know that they are a project of martyrs, and that whoever Israel assassinates there will be someone who will succeed him in leadership and on the field. However, assassinations remain one of the most powerful tools of pressure. And war against resistance movements.
Targeting Palestinian leaders and symbols
Lebanon has historically represented one of the most prominent theaters for Israeli assassinations, specifically during the war, due to its security fragility and ease of penetration. On the Palestinian level, the first operations were in September 1972, when the Mossad assassinated the Palestinian novelist and politician Ghassan Kanafani, with an explosive device in his car in Beirut, and he was buried in “Martyrs’ Cemetery”, with dozens of martyrs and Palestinian and Arab symbols buried there, since it became an official cemetery for the Palestine Liberation Organization in 1964.
In April 1973, Israel recorded its most prominent assassination operations, led by its former Prime Minister Ehud Barak, by infiltrating Beirut by sea, targeting 3 Palestinian leaders: Muhammad Youssef al-Najjar, Kamal Nasser, and Kamal Adwan, who were leaders of the Palestinian National Liberation Movement “Fatah” and the Palestine Liberation Organization. .
Israel continued its revenge operations in January 1979. After five failed attempts, it assassinated in Beirut the leader of the Palestine Liberation Organization and “Black September,” Ali Hassan Salama, nicknamed the “Red Prince,” who sparked controversy and worried Israel, and who married a beauty queen. Al-Koun” Lebanese Georgina Rizk, a year before his car was blown up, and he was martyred along with 4 of his guards.
Targeting Lebanese as well
The Israeli hand of treachery affected a large number of resistance symbols in Lebanon. In February 1984, Israel assassinated Sheikh Ragheb Harb, nicknamed “the sheikh of the martyrs of the Islamic resistance.”
In December 1989, Israel raided the headquarters of the Lebanese Communist Party in Rumaila in Mount Lebanon, martyring leaders from the Lebanese National Resistance Front, most notably Qasim Badran, Hikmat al-Amin (known as the doctor of the poor), and others.
In February 1992, Israel assassinated the second Secretary-General of Hezbollah, Abbas al-Musawi, by Israeli helicopters bombing his convoy south, hours after his speech on the anniversary of the martyrdom of Sheikh Ragheb Harb.
Sidon was shaken in May 2006 by the assassination of the Lebanese brothers Mahmoud and Nidal al-Majzoub, who were in the military leadership of the Islamic Jihad movement in Lebanon, with an explosive device planted in their car.
Hezbollah has a history of Israeli assassinations, the heaviest of which were in Syria, which constituted a “safe arena” for its leaders. It assassinated military commander Imad Mughniyeh in Damascus in February 2008, and assassinated military commander Hassan Laqqis in January 2013, in front of his home in Beirut.
In Syrian Quneitra, an Israeli raid assassinated a group of Hezbollah field commanders, most notably Imad Mughniyeh’s son Jihad, in January 2015. Then, in May 2016, it assassinated Imad Mughniyeh’s successor, military commander Mustafa Badr al-Din, near Damascus airport.
Expected reaction
Questions are rising in Lebanon at the present time about the repercussions of Israel’s deployment of an assassination weapon. A few days ago, after Al-Taweel’s martyrdom, a statement was issued by Hezbollah about security gaps that the people of the south warned about, stating, “The enemy continues to search for alternatives to collect information about the resistance and the whereabouts of its fighters, after losing him.” A large part of the effectiveness of spy devices is due to their destruction by the resistance.”
Writer and political analyst Hussein Ayoub says, “Israel tried to say that it is not targeting Hezbollah, the southern suburbs, or Lebanon by assassinating Al-Arouri, and that this is part of the open battle between it and Hamas, but Hezbollah acts as if it is concerned with responding to breaking the red lines, by targeting the Lebanese interior.” In the suburb, the initial response was to target the Meron base in the Upper Galilee.”
Ayoub believes that “targeting resistance leaders in the south – such as Al-Tawil – means that whenever the Israelis receive painful blows, they go towards taking advantage of the open theater of operations, especially in the south of the Litani, and try to put pressure on the party’s environment, to say that its hand is long and reaches every target and symbol with its open war.”
The political analyst believes that Israel will continue “trying to seize opportunities, just as in the Syrian field, after Hezbollah lost the element of surprise by responding on the northern front since October 8.”
He explains that Israel has been trying since 2006 to benefit from its failures, which were mentioned in the Winograd Commission report, the most important of which is the failure of the goal bank to match reality. He says, “Israel has accumulated experience in reaching its goals, benefiting from new technology such as artificial intelligence at the present time, and from the network of spies, and by placing data The American and British satellites that do not leave the skies of Lebanon are at their disposal, which means that the opportunities for superiority in some aspects cannot be denied.”
Ayoub considers that “Hezbollah stands today in a position of attack, not defense, while Israel stands in a position of defense opposite our borders, with a new equation for the history of the Arab-Israeli conflict.” He notes that Lebanon represents the only model whose resistance liberated the land in 2000, without restrictions and conditions, and it is the one that Today, it is striking different Israeli depths, and in return, Israel has not dared to implement its threat to expand the war.
