Four IDF soldiers killed in Hezbollah drone attack on northern Israel

ABC NEWS (Australia)

Diplomatic correspondent from The Times of Israel, Lazar Berman - says the destruction the Hezbollah drones caused is surprising.

Transcript

00:00The drones is something that Israel expected.

00:05It was the same type of suicide drone that Hezbollah has been firing for a year now.

00:10From the initial investigation, I can say that one of the drones was shot down, the

00:14other one Israel chased with fighter planes, with helicopters, and then it dropped off

00:18the radar.

00:19I think the assumption was that it had crashed, and therefore no sirens were sounded.

00:24And that's why these soldiers were caught in the dining hall, and that's why so many

00:28of them were gathered together.

00:29But certainly a very surprising, a very painful event, when you have four soldiers killed.

00:35The numbers right now are nine seriously injured, several more moderately injured, and then

00:40there's about 50 or so who were lightly injured.

00:43A really, really difficult incident, one that is a failure of the IDF to use its very advanced

00:51air defense systems.

00:52And this is not something that's supposed to happen.

00:54The IDF says it will learn lessons, and it will make sure that this doesn't happen again.

00:59And Israeli authorities still investigating this, so a lot of questions still to be answered.

01:04That's right, that's right.

01:05And as you know that these operations continue in southern Lebanon, Hezbollah is able to

01:13fire from well beyond the places where IDF troops are.

01:15So it's not like the fire threat has been diminished.

01:20Airstrikes have taken out some, actually a significant number of the arsenal, but Hezbollah's

01:25rocket arsenal is so big that they are able to continue to fire hundreds of rockets a day.

01:30Now this is less than the thousands that Israel expected, but it's a significant toll on the

01:36country and Israel's northern border communities are still empty.

01:39Of course the goal of the operation in Lebanon is to allow them to return.

01:42We now have a fifth peacekeeper wounded in southern Lebanon.

01:45The Israeli forces have urged UN peacekeepers to leave their positions, but a spokesperson

01:50for UNIFIL says that they've made a unanimous decision to stay in the border region.

01:55What is the IDF saying about their plans to proceed here and also what are you hearing

01:58about these plans?

02:00Sure, I've spoken to sources within the government of Israel, not the military, and they say

02:06there's no plan to apply military pressure to UNIFIL.

02:10They say the plan is to apply diplomatic pressure to talk to them.

02:14Of course there have been these incidents and the Israeli government says that these

02:18were operational mistakes, they will be investigated.

02:21There was that one incident where two tanks went into a UNIFIL position.

02:25The IDF says that that was done during an extraction under fire after Hezbollah fired

02:30anti-tank missiles at IDF troops.

02:33The tanks backed into a position, stayed there for a number of minutes, and then left, and

02:37then they also say that Israel was in touch with UNIFIL troops the entire time and that

02:42there was no danger presented.

02:43So I think this will continue to escalate between the two.

02:46It looks like Israel is going to continue to insist that UNIFIL forces move away from

02:51the border and away from combat areas.

02:53The United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres says these attacks on Lebanon peacekeepers

02:59could be a war crime.

03:01What's the reaction been to that in Israel?

03:03Well, Israel, we have so much going on now and the UN Secretary-General is really not

03:09a very popular figure.

03:11Some of his statements have really enraged Israelis over the past year.

03:15So that statement itself I think isn't going to attract much attention from Israelis.

03:21The general sense is that the UN is in general not especially friendly to Israel and UNIFIL

03:26has not fulfilled its mission in southern Lebanon, of course, since 2006.

03:30Its mandate was to keep Hezbollah forces, armed forces, out of southern Lebanon.

03:36The Lebanese army is supposed to be the only force there besides UNIFIL and obviously that

03:40is not the case.

03:41So there really is a lot of frustration in Israel right now.

03:44And finally, with the announcement of this missile defence system from the US, what is

03:49that telling us about the timing of this, given that we have Israel's move on Iran to

03:55come at any time, and also, you know, the reliance on the US in this?

04:02So I think the main significance of this is not actually the capabilities of Israel's

04:06missile defences, as you know, are quite advanced, perhaps the most advanced in the world, but

04:11it's a sign.

04:12It's a sign that the US, the Biden administration, is standing with Israel, is actually going

04:16to put almost 100 troops on the ground with this battery in Israel to defend against a

04:21potential Iranian reaction, or to deter an Iranian reaction.

04:26Israeli officials tell me that an attack will happen.

04:29They haven't said when and where and what the target is going to be, but they say as

04:33much as possible they are trying to coordinate with the United States, but if they need to,

04:37they will act in Israel's security interest.

04:40So this is something that the whole region is waiting for, ever since the October 1st

04:46Iranian ballistic missile attack, some of which got through, but most of which was intercepted.

04:51Liza Berman, thank you so much for speaking with us.

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