Tensions between Israel and the Lebanese political and militant group Hezbollah are a hair’s breadth away from a full-scale war amid back and forth border skirmishes, Israeli threats of an “extremely powerful” military operation and the assassination of a senior Hezbollah commander in Beirut last month.
Hezbollah reportedly has enough missile and drone firepower to wipe out up as much as $150 billion of key Israeli economic, industrial and food- growing facilities and assets in the country’s northern regions if tensions escalate into a full-scale confrontation.
Estimates by Iranian media suggest the Lebanese militia’s capabilities threaten the “economic heart of Israel,” an area in the country’s north accounting for some 80 percent of its grain production, 70 percent of its dairy supplies and 40 percent of its meat supply.
A Hezbollah response to aggression targeting Israeli agribusiness giants like Tnuva or Adom may “paralyze” Israel’s food market, the report suggests.
Over 60 percent of Israel’s oil refining and fuel production capacity is said to be concentrated around Acre Port, about 35 km south from the Lebanese border. That puts those sensitive economic targets in range of nearly all of Hezbollah's known arsenal of missiles and drones.
Drones have proven highly effective in overcoming Israel’s sophisticated air defense network — which is designed to handle an array of high-speed ballistic and cruise missile threats, but has proven less efficient in targeting slow-moving aerial vehicles flying close to the ground.
Hezbollah released a video Friday showing off a large underground missile base, with the video said to send a “clear message” to Israel that “the resistance in Lebanon today” has weapons, equipment, capabilities and capabilities “stronger than at any time” since its creation.