The IDF turned the tables on Hezbollah after eleven months of attacks by the Iranian-backed terrorist group. The IDF eliminated Ibrahim Aqil on Friday, only two days after Hezbollah walkie-talkies exploded and three days after thousands of Hezbollah members were injured by exploding pagers.
After many months where it seemed Israel was only responding proportionately to Hezbollah’s attacks, it now appears that Israel is turning the tables. Whether that will turn the tide of the war is not yet clear.
"I can now confirm that Ibrahim Aqil was eliminated together with other senior terrorists in Hezbollah’s Radwan Forces,” an IDF spokesperson said.
Who is Ibrahim Aqil?
Aqil has been a wanted terrorist for decades by the US for his role in killing Americans during bombings in the 1980s.
The IDF accused him of planning a major attack on Israel similar to the October 7 attack that Hamas carried out. Israel is now proving that its claim it can reach anyone who threatens Israelis is true.
Too big to fail?
Hezbollah is now suffering setback after setback. It is fearful and in chaos. It is also embarrassing. Its aging leadership such as Hassan Nasrallah and Naim Qassem must wonder if they still have enough cards in their hand to play. They have a large arsenal of rockets and missiles, and they have many new drones they have built, but are they ready for a major war? Is Hezbollah too big to fail? It will be consulting with Iran about its next moves.
Hezbollah has had an equation in its attacks on Israel since October 7. It began its attacks on October 8 targeting northern Israel. Israel evacuated northern communities. Hezbollah has mostly attacked the evacuated communities, usually claiming to target Israeli military sites.
In general, the Hezbollah attacks, of which there have been more than 8,500, have caused damage and also killed people, but they have not been a game-changer in terms of the war.
Hezbollah was prodded by Iran to attack to take the pressure off Hamas and create a multi-front war with Israel. It has settled into a routine of attrition. It sees this as an equation that it can benefit from. Israel has now turned the tables and upset the equation, driving through it and destroying its parameters.
Hezbollah has lost Fuad Shukr, a key commander, in July after it killed 12 people in Majdal Shams. It has lost dozens of its commanders in southern Lebanon.
Let’s review this Hezbollah posture for a second. Hezbollah’s Nasser unit controls the area from Bint Jbeil to the east, basically up to Mount Hermon. Taleb Sami Abdallah was the commander of the Nasser division. He was killed in June.
Muhammad Neamah Nasser was the commander of Hezbollah’s western Aziz division which controls the area from Bint Jbeil to the coast. He was killed in March.
The Hezbollah Aziz division controls an area that faces off against the IDF’s 300th Territorial Brigade which commands the western sector of the northern Galilee under the IDF’s 91st Division.
In essence, the key Hezbollah commanders controlling the border threats to Israel have been eliminated. In addition Radwan Force leader Wissam Tawil was also killed in January 2024.
Israel has eliminated around fifty percent of the Hezbollah commanders in southern Lebanon.
However, the slow drumbeat of eliminating Hezbollah commanders took place over time. In 11 months Hezbollah lost around 450 fighters. The group then suffered unprecedented losses on September 17 with around two dozen of its members killed due to the pager explosions and the September 18 walkie-talkie explosions. This brings the total to more than 470 Hezbollah members killed.
Hezbollah is now off balance. It prided itself on being an elite organization that functioned well, like a kind of state with an army. Now it is in a kind of chaos. As Israel stirs the pot, Hezbollah is making mistakes. It wants to lash out.
The meeting with Aqil and Radwan force commanders was probably a meeting designed to plot the next step for Hezbollah. Now Aqil is eliminated. This is a reminder of the days when Israel eliminated Hamas leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin in March 2004 and then also killed Hamas leader Abdel Aziz Rantisi the next month. This is how terror organizations can suffer setbacks.
However, the question is now whether Israel will exploit this turning of the tables. So far Iran has kept Hezbollah and other proxies in the drivers seat in terms of dictating the tempo of operations. Israel was reacting while focusing on Gaza and the West Bank. Now Israel may be ready for the northern front.
The question is what Iran and Hezbollah will do.