IDF Exposes New Hezbollah Cell in Golan
The Fellowship | March 13, 2019
As always, the Israeli military is ahead of the many threats that constantly form on each and every one of the nation’s borders. This time, The Times of Israel’s Judah Ari Gross reports, the IDF has uncovered a new terror cell that Hezbollah created on the Israeli-Syrian border in the Golan Heights:
The Israel Defense Forces said Wednesday that it had exposed a nascent Hezbollah terror cell established in a border village on the Syrian Golan Heights in recent months, and vowed to prevent the terrorist group from operating against Israel from Syrian soil, even at the risk of a sparking small-scale conflict.
The Iran-backed, Lebanon-based group has been trying to create a front on the Syrian Golan for years, but was unable to gain a sufficient foothold in the area until now. However, Syrian dictator Bashar Assad’s conquest of the border area this summer gave the regime-allied group an opportunity to again try to establish the necessary infrastructure with which it could threaten Israel near the border.
“The network is new and currently focused on becoming familiarized with the Golan Heights area. It is intended to eventually control teams of Syrian operatives who will launch attacks against Israel,” the military said in a statement.
At this stage the Hezbollah plot — known within the organization as the “Golan File” — mostly involves collecting intelligence and recruiting operatives, but also has weaponry in its possession, namely explosives, light arms, machine guns and antitank missiles, according to the IDF.
The military said the terror group may try to bring rockets, missiles and other weaponry into the area in the future, but is concerned that such munitions would be destroyed by Israeli strikes…
“It is very significant, except for the fact this is not completely new. Hezbollah, in the past [few] years, has been trying a few times to establish a military infrastructure in the Syrian side of the Golan, and this is the most updated one that the IDF has decided to reveal,” Zehavi said…