The Israeli navy has intercepted what it claims was shipment of weapons from Iran bound for Lebanon to be used by Hizballah. The weapons were seized Wednesday off the coast of Cypress by Israeli commandos.
Hizballah has denied any ties to the weapons.
The weapons were being offloaded by the Israeli navy, and so far all of the weapons were already known to be used by Hizballah. This information is important to the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) as it would indicate no new military capabilities of Hizballah. The cargo reportedly contained mostly small arms and katyusha rockets.
Israel has tried to draw a straight line from Iran to Hizballah with this confiscated shipment, saying that it had found paperwork aboard thee ship indicating that it had originated in Iran.
Iran is perhaps Israel’s staunchest enemy, and Israel has been claiming for years that Iran has been supplying Hizballah with weapons. In 2006, Israel fought a bloody and destructive 34-day war with Hizballah with arms that many believe originated in Iran, such as the C-802 Silkworm anti-ship missile that destroyed an Israeli naval vessel off the coast of Beirut near the start of the conflict.
Israeli PM, Benjamin Netanyahu claims that the weapons were “intended to hit Israeli cities”. While this may be an overstatement- the statement implies that the rockets would have been launched at Israel the moment that they ever made it into Hizballah hands- he has a point. During the 2006 War, Hizballah launched rockets from southern Lebanon that were reaching the northern Israeli port city of Haifa.The message was clear: we can hit your cities too.
So the value of the rockets is not in their destructive capabilities – they are on the small side and are highly inaccurate – but in their deterrence. Like bee stings, one at a time they are not destructive, but a barrage of 1000 can be lethal. The weapons are small, easy to transport, and easy to set up, which makes them near impossible to defend against.
The shipment, if it in fact was bound for Hizballah, tells us that they are probably going to be using similar weapons in the next war as they did in the last war. However, that is just what the situation “tells us”, and it doesn’t mean it’s true. Perhaps the weapons shipment was “discovered” on purpose, as to give the IDF the impression that Hizballah has the same old weapons and nothing more.
This is hard to believe. Hizballah officials have stated that if Israel tries to attack them in Lebanon again, that Hizballah would have some “surprises” for them. Last time, it was the shocking use of the Silkworm missile to dramatically destroy the IDF warship parked off the coast of Beirut (a skillful showman, Nasrallah was live on television at the time and directed viewers attention to the sea, where the missile was en route to the ship). Hizballah has had three years to resupply from 2006, and it’s certain that Nasrallah has some new tricks up his sleeve for the IDF.
The discovery of the alleged arms shipment to Hizballah also begs the question of why Iran would use the sea. The distance, by sea, from Tehran to Beirut is far longer than the distance from Tehran to Beirut overland, through Syria. And its much safer. There would be much less need to worry about prying eyes, considering the Iranian and Syrian governments would be in on it. The largest obstacle would be the Lebanese border, which may be controlled by the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF), but is hardly impossible to circumvent.
Instead the weapons were (allegedly) bound for Beirut by sea, where they would have to pass though international waters open to everyone, including the IDF. Also, the weapons would have to travel in a convoluted manner through North Africa, probably through Sudan, in order to avoid the tightly controlled Suez canal. So why not travel overland through Syria and avoid all the attention? All we con do at this point is speculate.
Presently, Israeli officials have not yet released the documents that they say prove the cargo was coming from Iran. And even if it was coming from Iran, the ship was captured off the coast of Cypress which hardly implicates Hizballah directly. So, unless more substantial proof is produced by Israel, it is likely that the international community will be suspicious of its claims.
For now, Israel may just have to be happy with taking many tons of weapons off the market that had a high likelihood of being used against them at some point, but it’s unlikely that we will ever know for sure who those weapons were bound for.
