In this regard, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other security officials announced the what they called "achievements" in the Lebanese front as very successful in order to inject morale into Israeli citizens.
Despite the fact that thousands of Lebanese civilians have been killed and injured by the regime's airstrikes over the past three days, Netanyahu on Tuesday, in a ridiculous statement addressed to the Lebanese people claimed that Tel Aviv's war is not with the Lebanese, but with Hezbollah, which uses its weapons to destroy the occupied territories.
Claiming that Hezbollah is using Lebanese civilians as a human shield, Netanyahu asked them to leave the southern areas and return to their homes after the end of the occupation army's operations. Netanyahu urged the Lebanese not to allow Hezbollah to endanger their lives.
On the other hand, the Israeli army claimed to have destroyed half of Hezbollah's missile power in recent days as an achievement on the battlefield, and its defense systems intercepted all missiles fired from the Lebanese side and did not allow them to hit their targets.
The illusions of the Israelis did not end here, to an extent that Defense Minister Yoav Galant went further and claimed that they were able to destroy all the weapons that Hezbollah had stored for 20 years in a short period of time.
Also, the leaders of the Israeli occupation consider the assassination of the resistance commanders as a heavy blow to the military power of Hezbollah, causing problems for the security and military apparatus of this movement.
On the other hand, massive attacks on civilians are also part of the Israeli regime's psychological warfare project to build the pressure on Hezbollah and the Lebanese government to prevent prolonged war.
Behind the psychological warfare Netanyahu and his cabal are seeking to display power and feign achievements to home and abroad, but it should not be forgotten that Hezbollah Secretary-General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah is the master of psychological warfare and is famous among the Israelis for his true promises and certainty of acting on his threats. Therefore, Nasrallah's address in the coming days will shatter all of the Israeli psychological warfare.
Internal distrust in Netanyahu; concerns of Israeli analysts about Hezbollah’s attacks
While the Netanyahu government's officials are talking about destroying half of Hezbollah's arms, the massive attacks against various parts of Israel show that Hezbollah's arsenal has not sustained serious damage.
Firing hundreds of rockets in the past few days to Tel Aviv and Haifa and dozens of other areas in the north of the occupied territories has terrified the Israelis, and according to the Israeli media, Haifa is now a ghost town.
With the procession of the Hezbollah’s missiles in the occupied territories, former Israeli officials just contrary to the cabinet figures recommend that Hezbollah's power should not be underestimated since the movement still can deal blows across the occupied territories.
Itzhak Brik, a former Israeli military general, commented on the new adventures in Lebanon, saying that "Netanyahu's decision is to continue the war in the Gaza Strip, and when this war of attrition continues for another year, the possibility of Israel's collapse in various fields will be high. The detonation of pagers strengthened the certainty of the continuation of the war of attrition. This is a real risk of the occurrence of a regional war on several fronts, in which Iran can also involve, and this process can accelerate the deterioration of Israel's conditions."
Amos Gilad, the head of political security at the Israeli army, said that "after this, we have to think about what to do. Do we have a strategy? You talk about spreading the war to Haifa, for example, this is our problem and not theirs. Are we ready for a large-scale operation against Hezbollah? We have no strategy."
Additionally, Former Mossad chief Danny Yatom questioned the optimistic view of the cabinet, asking: " What's the aim of these actions? So what?"
Also, on Tuesday, Israeli media outlets quoted Brigadier General Zvika Haimovich, the former commander of the air defense of this regime, as saying: "Hezbollah fired more than 180 missiles today, this party has the ability to do this within an hour." Pointing out that he does not agree with the Israeli army's assessment that 50 percent of Hezbollah's missiles were destroyed, he said: "Hezbollah has not fired as much as it could until this moment."
Former head of Internal Security Council of the Israeli regime, was another prominent Israeli figure who doubted the claims of destroying Hezbollah's military capabilities and said that Israel is not even close to destroying Hezbollah's capabilities and Tel Aviv is far from defeating or destroying Hezbollah's capabilities. He asserted: "Hezbollah started the war after firing tens of thousands of missiles towards Israel, and they have about 100,000 missiles at their disposal. Even if we shot down 30,000 Hezbollah missiles, it still has 70,000 missiles, and this number is 7 times more than Hamas' missiles."
Also, brigadier General Ronen Manelis, the former spokesman of the Israeli army, warned about ground invasion of Lebanon, saying that such an action is the" biggest dream of Hezbollah." He added that he does not think that the third war in Lebanon will happen, but this will be the first war of the Axis of Resistance.
"We are closer to the issue of war, we are trying to believe that Nasrallah will raise the white flag, but this is not one of his traits, the expectation of the Israeli cabinet is that if we increase the pressure a little, the work will be done quickly. So, I think there is a fundamental mistake in this idea," he said.
Israeli media reported that the war with Hezbollah will be long and complicated, and despite the attacks that Israel has carried out against this movement, the Lebanese resistance has not been destroyed and will not surrender.
Israel Army Radio reported that Hezbollah has not used its long-range missiles yet and that talking about the destruction of its military power is an illusion and a lie created by some political parties and rightists.
Ron Ben-Yishai, an Israeli journalist, said that at the beginning of the war, we must admit that Hezbollah threatens Israel on two fronts. First, on the domestic front, which includes military infrastructures and installations, and can target them with long-range missiles with heavy warheads, and the second is on the border front, which can be threatened by Redhwan Force, an elite unit, using missiles and drones.
2 million settlers within Hezbollah’s missile range
Gallant's claim that Israel destroyed Hezbollah weapons should be interpreted as such that the displaced Israeli settlers should no longer fear Lebanese attacks and the 70,000 that fled their homes on the border regions with Lebanon should comfortably return home. But the battleground realities are different from the Israeli narrative and allegations, showing that the conditions are not prepared for return of the displaced Israelis and even more could be displaced.
In this connection, the Israeli media reported that there are more than 2 million people who live in fear and terror in the areas that Hezbollah struck in the past three days. The displacement of 2 million Israelis is what Nasrallah had previously promised, and in the event of a full-scale war, the settlers will have no choice but to leave their homes.
Quoting mayors of the cities Hezbollah has attacked in recent days, Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper wrote that they do not have enough shelters. Some settlers in Kiryat Tiv'on in Haifa reported that the shelters in this town were locked. A settler from Kiryat Bialik also stated that he had not seen a similar situation even in 2006. In the city of Safad, which has been one of the main targets of Hezbollah, the situation is not better than in other places and not only the businesses are disrupted, but also the whole city is practically deserted, according to the Israeli media.
The city's mayor announced that half of the residents of this city cannot find shelters to protect them from missiles. Israeli Channel 14 reported that the number of Israelis in northern occupied Palestine asking for psychological help due to terror cases has increased by 30 percent.
The admission of the Israeli authorities and media about the consequences of engaging with Hezbollah is contrary to what the government officials' claim. Hezbollah is trying to stop the war in Gaza first, and on the other hand, it has repeatedly stated that it does not want to expand the scope of the conflict at the regional level. However, it has repeatedly warned that it is fully prepared for any scenario and that if the enemy wants to continue the war, the response will make them regret their actions against Lebanon. This is a promise part of which it has fulfilled two times in its massive attacks deep into the occupied territories, one in revenge for assassination of its top commander Fuad Shukr that struck the site of the elite military intelligence Unit 8200 and the second the response to the Sunday Israeli airstrike on the south.
Israeli analysts raise the possibility that Netanyahu and
his army commanders' allegations about destroying Hezbollah’s military
infrastructures and weapons are mainly meant to end the conflict, since
the Israelis know that with their engagement in full-scale war with
Lebanon, the occupied territories will be more insecure than before.
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