Israel’s Campaign to Disrupt Iran’s War Machine
Stand for Israel | August 26, 2019
This past weekend, the IDF carried out strikes in Syria that destroyed an Iranian terror planning suicide drone strikes in northern Israel (seen in the above video). This action was just the latest in Israel’s ongoing efforts to combat Iranian entrenchment in neighboring countries. Yaakov Lappin, JNS’ military expert and always intrepid man on the ground in the Holy Land, writes of the “deep struggle” underway that led Israel to publicize this latest strike:
The Israeli air strikes that rocked the Syrian village of Aqrabah, southeast of Damascus, on Saturday night are the latest phase in an ongoing shadow war against Iran which has been described by the Israeli defense establishment as an “active defense campaign.”
The strikes destroyed an Iranian cell active in Syria commanded by Quds Force chief Qassem Soleimani, which was planning multiple, simultaneous armed drone attacks on northern Israel, according to the Israel Defense Forces.
The Quds Force is Iran’s elite overseas operations unit. It has led efforts in recent years to build Iranian bases throughout Syria and turn the country into a new front against Israel. Those efforts have mostly been foiled by preventative Israeli actions, which rely on advanced intelligence-gathering capabilities and precision firepower.
The Quds Force also plays a central role in trafficking large quantities of weapons to Iran’s Lebanese proxy, Hezbollah.
Also on Saturday night, two drones crashed in Hezbollah’s stronghold in Dahiya, southern Beirut. One of the drones exploded, according to media reports, damaging a Hezbollah-owned office. Hezbollah claimed the drones belonged to Israel.
These incidents come days after U.S. officials said Israel was behind an air strike that destroyed an Iranian weapons storage facility in Iraq. That facility was reportedly a base run by the Iran-backed Popular Mobilization Forces Shi’ite militia. The base may have contained precision-guided missiles or other weapons that the Iranians stationed in Iraq temporarily, as part of a longer-term plan to shift them to Syria.
Ultimately, all these recent incidents can be viewed from a single vantage point. That perspective was spelled out clearly by IDF Maj. Gen (ret.) Yaakov Amdiror, former national security adviser to the prime minister of Israel and head of the National Security Council from 2011-2013.
“We are trying to prevent Iran from building an Iranian war machine in Syria,” Amdiror told JNS. “Everything else is a result of this effort…”