Israelis concerned that Hezbollah is digging underground tunnels into Israel in order to carry out Hamas-style attacks on Israeli civilians can relax – at least for now, said Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon.
“We have been examining every single complaint by residents of the north who say they hear construction and drilling sounds underground, and so far we have found nothing. But if Hezbollah wants to infiltrate Israel, they don't need tunnels,” Ya'alon said.
The IDF said Thursday that it had resumed examinations of areas of northern Israel where people complained of hearing underground noises – some of which were very loud, and sounded very much like the sound of heavy drilling.
The IDF, said Shimon Gueta, head of the Upper Galilee Regional Council, is taking these reports seriously and is actively examining these complaints.
Speaking to Arutz Sheva, Gueta said that he could not explain the phenomenon, but that he had spoken to many IDF officials, and all of them have said that so far, nothing has been found. “Because there have been so many complaints recently, they are intensifying the investigations,” he added.
But Hezbollah has other tactics to drag Israel into a war, Ya'alon said – one of which was evident in Wednesday's attack.
Hezbollah delivered a message through UNIFIL, the UN special patrol force in south Lebanon, saying that it was not seeking to increase tensions with Israel at this time. As far as the terror group is concerned, the message said, Wednesday's actions would satisfy Hezbollah's demands for revenge against Israel for last week's IDF attack on a convoy on the Syrian side of the Golan border.
But Ya'alon is not so sure about that.
“Hezbollah claims that this was a 'revenge' attack, and now that they have had their revenge things will calm down,” he said.
“But the reason for the IDF strike on Mughniyeh and Tabtabai was because they were preparing to set up a terror front on the Golan. That shows that they were preparing to increase tensions, possibly leading to war, before there was a need for this 'revenge.'”