The strike that killed Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah was months in the making and culminated in a fantastic bit of spycraft that discovered where and when Nasrallah would be on Friday, September 27.
According to the Wall Street Journal, Nasrallah was meeting with most of his commanders in the underground bunker more than 60 feet below Hezbollah headquarters in a quiet suburb of Beirut. The Friday afternoon meeting is what we might call in the West a "gripe session." The commanders were bitterly frustrated with Iran for Tehran's refusal to "take the leash" off of the group and allow it to go after the Israelis with their ballistic missiles and other heavy weapons.
Israel knew of the meeting. They knew the time it was taking place and the location. And they knew that Nasrallah was going to be there.
Does Hezbollah have a mole in its midst? Nasrallah had rarely gone out in public since the 2006 war ended and had a very small circle of advisors. Israel has some of the most sophisticated SIGINT (signals intelligence) in the world and may have found a way to penetrate the security around Nasrallah and gain access to his inner circle.
Sometime near dusk on Friday, "Israel’s air force struck the bunker with about 80 tons of bombs," says the Journal. "The attack used a series of timed, chained explosions to penetrate the subterranean bunker," a senior Israeli military official told the publication.
The crater left by the blast was 65 feet deep. Here's what 6 2,000-pound bombs sound like when they hit the target. (Note: Turn the sound down on your headphones before running the video).
Prime Minister Netanyahu approves the Elimination of Nasrallah and the entire high command of Hezbollah
— Dr.Manoj Pandey (@mpandey03) September 27, 2024
Thus Big dragon gone to Assembly of 72 Hoor with his entire High command and team members #Netanyahu #Beirut #LebanonUnderAttack #Nasrallah #Hezbollah pic.twitter.com/MK5XudBEv5
"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."
That strike and the 2000 other sorties over the last 48 hours by the Israeli Air Force that targeted Hezbollah have been a smashing success. Not only were Nasrallah and several senior leaders of Hezbollah killed, but Hezbollah's stock of 150,000 missiles has been vastly reduced thanks to several well-placed strikes on missile storage facilities. One Israeli security official said "a very respectable portion" of Hezbollah's missile stocks had been destroyed. Another claimed that "20-25%" of Hezbollah's missile stock had been depleted.
Israel’s operational planning for Friday’s strike began months ago, with military officials identifying how to pierce an underground bunker in southern Beirut with a series of timed explosions, with each blast paving the way for the next one. The attack was one of the largest single airstrikes on a major city in recent history.
Israeli officials began to discuss seriously the option of killing Nasrallah in recent days, according to a person briefed on the matter. The exact timing of the strike, Israeli officials said, was opportunistic, coming after Israeli intelligence learned about the meeting hours before it occurred.
“We had real-time intelligence that Nasrallah was gathering with many senior terrorists,” said an Israeli military spokesman, Nadav Shoshani.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was in New York at the opening session of the UN General Assembly when he gave the go-ahead for the strike on Nasrallah.
Netenyahu approving the airstrike targeting Hezbollah leader Nasrallah from New York today. pic.twitter.com/qGjOdlzUCo
— Clash Report (@clashreport) September 27, 2024
“What it says is that Israel is serious about stopping this persistent threat from Hezbollah, and they’re willing to accept a lot of risks of doing it,” said Joseph Votel, a retired four-star general and former commander of U.S. forces in the Middle East. “The weight of the strike was designed to ensure they had the greatest chance of being successful in killing Nasrallah.”
Good strategy. If you're going to take a shot at the king, don't miss. Imagine the boost it would have given Hezbollah's morale if Nasrallah had walked out of that hole alive.
Prime Minister Netanyahu has been giving a seminar on courageous leadership these last few days. He has shown what a leader can do to protect his country and not worry about domestic or foreign opinion.
His nation will survive and win its conflicts against its enemies largely because of him.
