When Israeli forces invaded Lebanon in July 2006, they faced difficulties from the start. For weeks, the troops were “trapped” less than a kilometer and a half from Lebanese territory. Israeli tanks were hit by explosives or fired upon by Hezbollah rockets: 121 Israeli soldiers lost their lives.
The 34-day conflict, in which Hezbollah launched a cross-border attack and captured two soldiers, ended with both sides claiming victory despite heavy casualties.
“The Israeli military was not prepared for a large-scale ground operation,” Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmer, who was in power at the time, told the Washington Post.
In a scathing assessment of Israel’s military campaign, the government-appointed Winograd Commission stated that the decision to go to war was hasty and the operation poorly planned. There were gaps in information, according to the Commission, and a “missed opportunity” to deal a much heavier blow to Hezbollah.
The Israeli invasion of Lebanon has begun – Beirut is being attacked again
He took into account the lessons of the past
Now, as Israel prepares for yet another ground invasion, the military establishment appears to have heeded the lessons of the past.
Over the past 10 days, Israel has attacked and paralyzed Hezbollah’s logistics and communications infrastructure, destroyed key weapons caches, and killed its top commanders, including the movement’s longtime leader, Hassan Nasrallah.
The attacks surprised the Islamic group, humiliating a group whose reason for being is to fight Israel. But it is also proof of Israel’s many years of preparation, including intelligence gathering, military exercises, detailed battle plans and a multi-layered air defense system.
If Israeli ground troops enter Lebanon, It will be the fourth Israeli invasion in the last 50 years. Each time, Israel tried to drive enemies away from its borders.
The chronicle of the invasions that gave rise to Hezbollah
The first invasion, in 1978, aimed to push back Palestinian militants and seize a narrow strip of land along the border where around 100,000 Palestinians took refuge when they were forced to abandon their homes following the Nakba (catastrophe) during the war in independence. of Israel in 1948.
Later, the Palestine Liberation Organization used southern Lebanon as a base of operations.
After Israel’s full-scale invasion in 1982, its troops remained in the country for almost two decades. The occupation helped give rise to Hezbollah, which was founded with the stated aim of expelling Israeli forces.. The army was finally forced out in 2000, with Hezbollah firing a ferocious barrage of mortars and rockets as the troops withdrew.
2006: “Exhausted” goals.
The 2006 war was “a completely different ball game,” said Oded Eilam, a former senior officer in Israel’s Mossad intelligence agency.
TThe first Israeli tank crossed the border hours after Hezbollah kidnapped two soldiers and killed three others during a patrol. Tripped over a mine, resulting in 4 more soldiers killed.
In the initial air attack, according to Eilam, Israeli jets managed to bomb 75 long-range rocket launchers, in an operation that lasted just 34 minutes. These launchers represented about two-thirds of Hezbollah’s long-range missile capacity.
But the list of strategic targets, vital to maintaining pressure, was exhausted within a few days.
“We suffer from a lack of information,” he said. “That means you’re operating blindly.”
“We started disappearing buildings”
It was only when Israel launched a devastating attack on the southern suburbs of Beirut, a Hezbollah stronghold, that the war began to change. “It changed the course of the engagement,” Eilam said. “We really started destroying buildings – 20 to 30 stories high. It was a shockwave for Hezbollah.”
“Bank” of thousands of targets
Since then, Israel has dramatically improved its intelligence services, creating a bank of thousands of targets that can be hit in any war, he said. In 2011, Israeli intelligence had already mapped 1,000 targets in the south, the Washington Post reported at the time.
Lessons also for Hezbollah
But Hezbollah has also learned lessons since 2006, said Paul Salem, an expert at the Beirut-based Middle East Institute. Nasrallah admitted mistakes after the end of the war, saying he would not have approved the cross-border ambush if he had known the level of destruction that would follow.
“Over the next 18 years, apparently with massive support from Iran, they vastly increased their missile and drone capabilities, their tunnels and defenses,” Salem said.
“Top Islamic organization on the ground”
Without its leaders, Hezbollah could struggle to repel a ground invasion. But although Israel has far superior air power, experts say Hezbollah fighters have a better chance against Israeli troops on the ground.
The group has years of combat experience in Syria, where its fighters have sided with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad against a number of rebels. His forces also have in-depth knowledge of the terrain in southern Lebanon, which gives them an advantage over the well-equipped Israeli army.
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