IDF reveals additional intelligence on Hezbollah sites in Beirut

Footage filmed inside the Jnah location shows tools and equipment needed to produce precision missiles

OCTOBER 3, 2020 15:26

IDF reveals more intelligence on Hezbollah sites in Beirut (Credit: IDF Spokesperson's Unit)

Days after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced that Hezbollah is storing precision missiles at three sites in a residential neighborhood in Beirut, which led the terror group to show off the site to journalists, the IDF has used footage from the tour to identify machines used to manufacture precision missiles.

On Wednesday, the IDF provided detailed maps and GPS coordinates of the sites which are in the Jnah, Laylaki and Chouaifet neighborhoods under residential apartment buildings and near a mosque, medical center and gas stations.

Turns out you need more than one hour to evacuate a Precision Guided Missile (PGM) manufacturing site, so Hezbollah hoped the reporters just wouldn't notice. Well... we did. Here’s what was hiding in plain sight: pic.twitter.com/8rPv0szslM
— Israel Defense Forces (@IDF) October 2, 2020

Following Netanyahu’s speech to the UN General Assembly on Wednesday, Hezbollah organized a media tour of the site that they claim is a civilian iron workshop. Footage filmed by several media outlets showed crowds of people, as well as machines and other tools that are used to manufacture precision missiles.

The machines include a laser, hydraulic and manual cutting machines – all used to cut metals at angles and dimensions required to create missile stabilization fins, as well as engine casings and missile warheads.

Other tools seen in the footage were a bending machine, which is used to shape the metals that make up the engine casings, warheads, and rocket’s navigation component housings. There was also a rolling machine, which is used to form metal cylinders, which can then be used to form engine components, warheads and navigation component casings.

IDF intel on Hezbollah sites Beirut (Credit: IDF Spokesperson's Unit)

The site is said to be run by an active Hezbollah member, Muhammad Kamel Fouad Rimal, who was interviewed at the site on Wednesday and denied being a member of the terror group. According to the IDF, in addition to being the site manager, he works closely with Iranian forces on the production aspect of the precision missile project and has flown to Iran several times with other operatives from the group.

The site in the Jnah neighborhood near the Iranian embassy was first reported by The Jerusalem Post in July based on a report by the ALMA Research and Education Center. According to the report, “based on our insight into Hezbollah’s action and patterns, these sites are available for immediate operational use.”

IDF infographic on Muhammed Kamel Fad Ramal (Credit: IDF Spokesperson's Unit)

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Similar to the site in Laylaki, the site in the Chouaifet neighborhood is underground below five residential buildings. In footage shared by the IDF on Friday, a suspicious commercial vehicle arrived at the site and left it several hours later, heading to another underground site located under a residential apartment building in the Bourj el-Barajneh neighborhood which the military says is also used by Hezbollah.

Two years ago during a speech to the UN General Assembly in New York, Netanyahu said that Hezbollah had missile storage facilities in residential areas in the Lebanese capital, including near the city’s airport, which lies just south of the Bourj el-Barajneh neighborhood.

Hezbollah is estimated to have an arsenal of between 130,000-150,000 rockets and missiles of all sorts of ranges and payloads. And while its arsenal is mostly comprised of small, man-portable and unguided surface-to-surface rockets and missiles with ranges of between 10 km. and 500 km., the group is continuing to work on its precision missile project.

Hezbollah’s project to build accurate and precise missiles, which is done using Iranian know-how, funding and guidance, has been targeted by Israel on numerous occasions in Syria, and according to foreign reports in Iraq and Lebanon as well, as part of Israel’s war-between-wars campaign.

Israel has reiterated several times that the transfer of any advanced weaponry to Hezbollah is a red line and that it will work to prevent any such movement. As such, despite the effort and years invested, the organization is reported to have only several dozen precision missiles.