Beirut
CNN
—
The leader of the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah threatened on Wednesday to attack the European island of Cyprus if war breaks out between Israel and Lebanon.
“Cyprus will also be part of this war” if it opens its airports and bases to Israeli forces, Hassan Nasrallah said in a televised address. Just a day earlier, Israel had warned the powerful Iranian-backed militant group that the prospect of “total war” was “very close.”
With these comments, the Hezbollah leader is threatening Cyprus for the first time. The country is an EU member state in the Mediterranean, around 200 kilometers from Lebanon. Since 2014 and as recently as last year, it has been conducting joint military exercises with Israel.
Nasrallah’s threat was part of a heated response to Israel’s warning. He had boasted about his group’s growing capabilities and threatened to shake Israel’s “foundations” if war was forced on Lebanon.
Tensions between Hezbollah and Israel have been rising since the October 7 Hamas attacks and the subsequent military campaign by the Israel Defense Forces in Gaza. In recent weeks, the intensity of cross-border attacks between the two countries has increased, raising fears of a full-scale war.
Khalil Hassan/Reuters/File
Hassan Nasrallah speaks to his supporters during an Ashura ceremony in the southern suburbs of Beirut, Lebanon, on October 23, 2015.
That outlook worsened on Tuesday when Hezbollah released a nine-minute drone video showing civilian and military positions in and around Haifa, one of Israel’s largest cities. The video prompted Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz to warn of an “all-out war” in which “Hezbollah will be destroyed and Lebanon will be severely beaten.”
On Wednesday, Nassrallah celebrated the video as evidence of his growing intelligence-gathering ability.
“The enemy knows that no place in the entire (state) is safe from our rockets, and the attacks will not be indiscriminate. Everything will be targeted,” Nasrallah said in his speech.
“We have hours of footage of Haifa, of the outskirts of Haifa and of what is coming to Haifa and what is coming after Haifa,” Nasrallah said, apparently referring to a Hezbollah slogan from the 2006 war with Israel, when the group’s rockets first hit Haifa.
In response to Nasrallah’s threat, Cyprus’ President Nikos Christodoulides stated that the island was “in no way involved in the war conflicts”.
“The Republic of Cyprus is not part of the problem. The Republic of Cyprus is part of the solution,” said Christodoulides. “And our role in this, as demonstrated, for example, by the humanitarian corridor, is recognized not only by the Arab world but by the entire international community.”
Parts of the Hezbollah footage taken during the day are said to show Krayot, a collection of “densely populated” residential towns with shopping centers and high-rise buildings north of the Israeli city of Haifa and 28 kilometers south of the Lebanese border.
Other parts are said to show a military complex of the Israeli arms manufacturer Rafael near Haifa – including Iron Dome batteries, missile storage facilities and radar installations – as well as military boats, ships and oil storage facilities in the port of Haifa.
03:24 – Source: CNN
Tensions between Israel and Hezbollah are increasing
CNN analysis has located the video in multiple locations around Haifa. These locations include several sensitive areas, including at least two military installations: a base in northern Haifa and the port of Haifa. The drone also flew over the oil tanks in northern Haifa, Haifa airport and several residential areas.
CNN also analyzed shadows in the videos, which suggest that the drone operation over Haifa lasted several hours or spanned several days. The analysis shows that parts of the video were sped up.
Weapons expert Wim Zwijnenburg, project manager for humanitarian disarmament at the Dutch peace organization PAX, told CNN that a drone visible in the footage appears to be “a model of a Qasaf-2k of Iranian origin, possibly manufactured locally.”
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The video released by Hezbollah shows the port area of Haifa.
Haifa Mayor Yona Yahav called the video “psychological terror” and called for a protection plan for his city. He criticized IDF commanders for not visiting Haifa since the October 7 Hamas attack.
“I demand that the government present a plan for the massive defense of Haifa and find a military solution to eliminate the threat from the north,” Yahav told Israeli radio station Reshet bet.
Hezbollah claimed the video was the “first episode” and hinted that more videos would emerge from deep inside Israel.
A Hezbollah member of the Lebanese parliament, who referred to the video in a social media post, also hinted that more would follow.
“This is what the party (Hezbollah) has proclaimed and what you have seen, but what is hidden is bigger and bigger and bigger! Haifa and beyond, beyond and beyond Haifa,” Ibrahim Mousawi said in the post.
His message appears to be an allusion to a phrase Nasrallah used during the war between Israel and Hezbollah in 2006. At the time, he said the Hezbollah militia would fire rockets at Haifa “and beyond.”
However, Israeli government spokesman David Mencer described the drone video as the usual “malicious propaganda” and said: “We know exactly how we will deal with (Hezbollah) in one way or another – diplomatically or by military means.”
03:24 – Source: CNN
Tensions between Israel and Hezbollah are increasing
Israel is preparing for the possibility that diplomatic efforts to reduce hostilities with Hezbollah could fail. The release of the footage came after the Israeli military said it had “approved and confirmed” operational plans for an offensive in Lebanon and made decisions to increase the readiness of troops on the ground.
The plans were approved by the commander of the Northern Command and the head of the Operations Directorate as part of a joint situation assessment in preparation for the continuation of hostilities, the Israel Defense Forces said in a statement.
While the approval of the operational plans does not mean that war between Israel and Hezbollah is imminent, it does signal that Israel intends to be prepared for such a scenario.
Responding to the Hezbollah video, Israel Defense Forces Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi said on Wednesday that the Israeli military was “preparing and developing solutions to deal with these and other capabilities.”
“We have many more forces in the Israeli army involved in an offensive against Hezbollah,” Halevi said, speaking to Israeli soldiers at an air defense battery along Israel’s northern border with Lebanon.
“I believe the enemy knows little about our capabilities and will counter them at the right time if necessary,” Halevi added.
Hezbollah has fired more than 5,000 rockets, missiles and drones at northern Israel since October 7, claiming its attacks were an act of solidarity with the Palestinian people.
Hezbollah has stated in the past that it will only stop shelling Israel if Israel ends the war in the Gaza Strip.
Israel, for its part, has carried out hundreds of raids in Lebanon and evacuated some 60,000 residents from its northern border. More than 90,000 Lebanese have also fled their homes in the region.
The US has been seeking a diplomatic way out to prevent a larger war from spreading to the region. This week it sent special envoy Amos Hochstein to Israel and Lebanon to try to ease tensions there.
A day after the end of the Biden adviser’s visit, further cross-border shooting between Israel and Hezbollah occurred on Wednesday amid recent hostilities along the contested border.
Hezbollah announced that four of its fighters from southern Lebanon were killed, but did not provide details on the time and manner of their deaths. The Iran-backed group also announced that it had attacked Metula and Kryat Shmona in northern Israel with drones.
Videos shared by Lebanese media close to Hezbollah showed plumes of smoke rising from the southern Lebanese village of Burghalia following an Israeli attack. According to state news agency NNA, there were further attacks on other Lebanese villages, including Mais Al-Jabal, Talat Al-Awaida, Al-Khiyam and Hula.
