While Israel Defense Forces continues focusing on dismantling the terrorist organization Hamas in Gaza and its vast subterranean tunnel network, Israel faces an even greater security threat in the north from Hezbollah terror forces in Lebanon, according to security expert Tal Beeri.
Beeri, the head of the Alma Research and Education Center, has warned Israel that the Iranian-backed terror group Hezbollah has even more advanced tunnel infrastructure than Hamas, and poses a considerably larger threat against northern Israeli communities.
Alma is an NGO dedicated to security-related research on Israel’s northern borders.
In 2021, Beeri documented the vast and sophisticated Hezbollah tunnel network in what he calls the “Land of the Tunnels” in southern Lebanon, close to the Israeli border. Iran and North Korea have played a crucial role in assisting Hezbollah with the tunnel infrastructure development project since the Second Lebanon War in 2006.
According to Beeri's 2021 report, Hezbollah’s vast tunnel network consists of 36 interconnected regions in Lebanon, shaped as polygons.
“In our assessment, these polygons mark Hezbollah’s staging centers as part of the ‘defense’ plan against an Israeli invasion of Lebanon. Each local staging center (‘defense’) possesses a network of local underground tunnels. Between all these centers, an infrastructure of regional tunnels was built, interconnected [with] them,” Beeri explained.
The Israeli security expert is particularly concerned about Hezbollah’s 45-kilometer (28-mile) attack tunnel network that directly threatens northern Israeli communities. Beeri's research was initially met with some skepticism, which he addressed by stating: "We compiled and collected information from a series of sources and videos about the work on the tunnels, including a 2007 video in which Imad Mughniyeh, the Hezbollah number two who was assassinated in February 2008, was seen inside the attack tunnel. We attached an original map that we found online, on which somebody had marked the route, and we did ‘reverse engineering.’ That’s how we put together what seemed to be the route of the 45-km tunnel,” he wrote.
Read the full article at All Israel News.