Hezbollah commander unveils new weapon on Al Mayadeen
7 Min Read
The commander of Hezbollah's anti-armored munitions unit reveals a new NLOS weapon developed by the Resistance in the face of the Israeli occupation.
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Hezbollah anti-armor unit commander Hajj Jihad in an exclusive interview for Al Mayadeen, on February 26, 2023. (Al Mayadeen)
Since the start of the confrontations on the Lebanese-Palestinian border area on October 8, there have been talks within "Israel" about the "anti-armor weapons" possessed by Hezbollah, with there being grave concerns about the Resistance's capabilities.
Israeli political, military, and media spheres have expressed great fear of the development of the capabilities of the Islamic Resistance in Lebanon, which has become "a master in missile sniping."
Anti-armor missiles are one of the many specialties of the Islamic Resistance in Lebanon, and the status quo of the battlefield in the current limited confrontation has made this type of weapons take the lead at this stage.
Al Mayadeen Exclusive | "During 2006 [war on Lebanon], the Israeli enemy soldiers abandoned a Gill Spike missile system and fled, while the [Lebanese] fighters seized this equipment and it was subsequently transferred to the Islamic Republic of #Iran."
— Al Mayadeen English (@MayadeenEnglish) February 26, 2024
- A commander in… https://t.co/GyzflueoDW
A commander in Hezbollah's anti-armor unit told Al Mayadeen in an exclusive interview that the Islamic Resistance in Lebanon is a large group with specialized divisions, with each division possessing its own battle system.
In this operation, Hezbollah's anti-armor capabilities had the lion's share in the fighting due to the nature of the mission, but the other divisions, each of which has their own set of skills, have not fully participate in the battle, and only did so in a limited manner. Had they fully participated, the commander said, the Israeli occupation "would have seen things it would never have expected."
The official continued by saying that the advantages that made anti-armor munitions the star of this battle are "flexibility, effectiveness, and simplicity." Flexibility "qualifies they to operate in this battle against threats and shellings," while simplicity relates to "the simplicity of training and use."
As for effectiveness, the anti-armor units are used to confront the occupation's forces, who use tanks and armored personnel carriers, as these munitions "are effective against all enemy targets."
Addressing the operations carried out by the Resistance since October 8, Al Mayadeen's political and Lebanese affairs analyst, Abbas Fneish, said that the escalation was gradual.
During the first two weeks, "all the targets were positioned in the open, as the Resistance targeted tanks, personnel, and outposts." Most of these targets were hit with anti-armor weapons, he clarified.
Later, the Resistance began to pursue the occupation, as it went deeper into Israeli territory and hid in groves and newly established posts, Fneish added. The developments and results themselves speak for the effectiveness of the anti-armor unit, with dozens of destroyed Israeli tanks and military sites, not to mention fortified positions where Israeli soldiers hid.
Paramount Israeli destruction
A tally done by Al Mayadeen revealed all the Israeli losses suffered due to the Resistance's operations using anti-armor munitions, which included 460 strikes with guided munitions and 105 strikes with unguided munitions.
The strikes in question include 87 that were carried out from weapons yet to be unveiled by the Resistance, 82 of which used guided weapons, with the remaining 5 using unguided weapons.
Fneish underlined that the Resistance was adhering to secrecy because it did not want to put all of its cards on the table, as its confrontation with the Israeli occupation continues to unfold.
This is a breakdown of all the different weapons used by the Resistance against the Israeli occupation forces.
Guided munitions
Kornet: 128
Fagot: 95
TOW: 56
Tharallah: 28
Special system (Almas): 23
Malyutka: 23
Kornet (8-10km): 14
Metis: 8
MILAN: 3
Other: 82
Unguided munitions
SPG-9 recoilless rifle: 36
106 recoilless rifle: 24
B-10 recoilless rifle: 22
82mm mortar: 9
RPG-29 : 4
RPG-7: 3
57 recoilless rifle: 2
Other: 5
'Israel' defeated
After the group's capabilities were displayed in full by the sheer number of operations it carried out against the Israeli occupation, the Hezbollah commander underlined that the Resistance has effectively defeated the Israeli occupation, but stressed that this was not anything new.
"We did not defeat the enemy today, we defeated them when we destroyed the Merkava tank in 1993," he said. "We defeated the enemy when we turned the entire border area into a ghost town. We defeated the enemy when one of its experts said we are having sleepless nights; when we destroyed its reinforcements to pave the way for the entry of our freedom fighters."
"We defeated the enemy when we surprised them by using the Kornet in 2006, turning the Hujeir Valley into a graveyard of tanks," he said.
Today the Israeli occupation stands bewildered in the face of the Resistance's anti-armor capabilities, the Hezbollah top commander stressed.
"One of the tricks up our sleeves during this battle is that anti-armor munitions are no longer the only weapon in our possession, as was the case in 2006," he added. "The battle today is with reinforcements and infantry troops, which called for us to put into commission new kinds of munitions."
"There are missiles capable of destroying houses and killing everyone inside of them. Thermobaric missiles are capable of destroying whole houses and killing everyone inside," the Hezbollah commander said.
Abbas Fneish went on to highlight that the Resistance put into commission three types of missiles, the first one is thermobaric missiles with a range of 8-10 km, the second is the Tharallah system, and the third is a special precision-guided system.
Most sophisticated missile
The third system in question was made after Resistance fighters managed to capture a Spike MR abandoned by Israeli soldiers who had escaped during the 2006 July War. The missile system was taken and sent to the Islamic Republic of Iran, it was revealed to Al Mayadeen.
The Spike is one of the most sophisticated anti-armor weapons in the world; it is equipped with a camera that allows whoever is controlling it to manually seek the target, and the latter does not have to be within its plane of sight.
"We have a weapon that does not need a target that is within its plane of sight. This weapon was used the first time to destroy a Merkava in 'Metulla'. Several targets have been engaged with this weapon," the Hezbollah top commander said.
"The enemy is hiding this information and preventing it from being published so that its soldiers are not frightened and end up deserting," he stressed.
That weapon, he said, is the Almas. "The Resistance saw that this was the right moment to unveil this weapon."
"Numerous systems were left on the battlefield, and the Israelis carried out air raids thinking that it would manage to destroy them, but they failed and this remained a secret," Fneish told Al Mayadeen.
When Hezbollah fighters got hold of the weapon, they contacted Hajj Imad Mughniyeh who, in turn, contacted Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, and they wound up sending it to Iran. "The Resistance sought to reverse-engineer the weapon, thus creating the Almas."
