The Israeli military on Thursday released satellite images of three sites in Beirut that it says are being used by the Iran-backed Hezbollah terror group to hide underground precision missile production facilities.
The sites, located within close proximity of Beirut’s international airport, were first revealed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday night, during his speech at the United Nations General Assembly.
The factories, which are meant to convert regular missiles into more accurate precision ones, are not believed to be up and running. The Israel Defense Forces said they are currently being constructed with Iranian assistance.
The target of the Israeli airstrike last week, in which a Russian spy plane was inadvertently shot down by Syrian air defenses, was machinery used in the production of precision missiles, which was en route to Hezbollah, The Times of Israel has learned.
According to Netanyahu, these precision missiles are capable of striking with 10 meters (32 feet) of their given target. Hezbollah is believed to have an arsenal of between 100,000 and 150,000 rockets and missiles, though the vast majority are thought to lack precision technology.
They army said the facilities are “another example of Iranian entrenchment in the region and the negative influence of Iran.”
Holding up aerial photos of the alleged Hezbollah facilities, Netanyahu warned: “Israel knows what you are doing, Israel knows where you are doing it, and Israel will not let you get away with it.”
Netanyahu accused the Lebanese terror group of “deliberately using the innocent people of Beirut as human shields.”
According to the Israel Defense Forces, Hezbollah began working on these surface-to-surface missile facilities last year.
Reports that Iran was constructing underground missile conversion factories in Lebanon first emerged in March 2017.
Since then, Israeli officials have repeatedly said that Israel would not abide such facilities.
In January, Netanyahu said Lebanon “is becoming a factory for precision-guided missiles that threaten Israel. These missiles pose a grave threat to Israel, and we will cannot accept this threat.”
One of the alleged sites is located under a soccer field used by a Hezbollah-sponsored team; another is just north of the Rafik Hariri International Airport; and the third is underneath the Beirut port and less than 500 meters from the airport’s tarmac.
These three are not the only facilities that the IDF believes are being used by Hezbollah for the manufacturing and storage of precision missiles.
“Israel is monitoring these sites with a variety of capabilities and tools, has significant knowledge of the precision project and is working to fight it with a variety of operational responses, techniques and tools,” the army said.
In May, Netanyahu said Israel was “operating against the transfer of deadly weapons from Syria to Lebanon or their manufacture in Lebanon.”
In recent years, Israel has acknowledged conducting hundreds of airstrikes in Syria, which it says were aimed at both preventing Iran from establishing a permanent military presence in Syria and blocking the transfer of advanced munitions to Hezbollah in Lebanon.
The Israeli Air Force has largely abstained from conducting raids inside Lebanon itself, though it has indicated that it was prepared to do so.
Earlier this year, IAF chief Amiram Norkin showed visiting generals a picture of an Israeli F-35 stealth fighter flying next to Beirut’s airport, in what was seen as a direct message to Hezbollah.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused Lebanese terror group Hezbollah, an Iranian proxy, of “brazenly lying” to the international community over the secret weapons facilities in and around Beirut, which the Israeli premier disclosed on the world stage at the United Nations General Assembly last week.
Netanyahu said in a statement Monday that Lebanese Foreign Minister Gibran Bassil took 73 foreign envoys on a “fraudulent propaganda tour” of the alleged missile sites, where he failed to show them the underground facilities where Hezbollah is reportedly storing precision-guided missiles.
“Hezbollah is brazenly lying to the international community by means of the fraudulent propaganda tour of the Lebanese foreign minister who took ambassadors to the soccer field [one of the alleged missile sites] but refrained from taking them to the nearby underground precision missile production facility,” Netanyahu said.
On Monday, Bassil led a group of the ambassadors around a pool complex and the sports stadium in a bid to disprove the Israeli accusations.
“Today Lebanon is raising [its] voice by addressing all countries of the world… to refute Israel’s allegations,” Bassil was quoted as saying. Israel’s Channel 10 news said Monday night that Lebanon feared Israel may attack the sites.
Netanyahu said the envoys “should ask themselves why [Lebanese authorities] waited three days to give them a tour.” The PM said in the September 27 address to the UN General Assembly that Hezbollah had secret missile conversion sites in and around Beirut.
One of the alleged sites is located under a soccer field used by a Hezbollah-sponsored team; another is just north of the Rafik Hariri International Airport; and the third is underneath the Beirut port and less than 500 meters from the airport’s tarmac.
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