The Israeli Radio reported that a number of Israeli security and military officials threatened that Israel could invade southern Lebanon should the security situation in villages there continue to deteriorate.The officials claimed that the Lebanon-based Hezbollah party “transformed villages in southern Lebanon into explosive areas”, and that the party deployed combat materials and weapons in the villages and installed bases and headquarters.
Israeli paper, Haaretz, reported that Lieutenant Avi Kochavi, head of the Israeli Military Intelligence Division, recently visited the United States and held talks with American officials informing them that Syria intends to deliver advanced weaponry to Hezbollah should the popular protests against the regime of President Bashar Assad manage to topple him.
Haaretz said that Kochavi’s visit and talks with U.S. officials were discreetly held in Washington three weeks ago, and that he met with ambassadors of Security Council member countries in New York.
The talks focused on the situation in Syria and Lebanon, while Kochavi told the officials that Israel fears that the collapse of Al Assad regime could give Hezbollah the chance to obtain advanced Syrian army weapons.
Furthermore, Kochavi told UN officials in New York, and member countries of the Security Council that Syria helped in organizing protests, and was involved in the attempts to cross into the Golan Heights during the Nakba and Naksa commemoration. (Israel’s occupation of historic Palestine in 1948 and its occupation of the rest of the Arab and Palestinian territories in 1967.
Haaretz added that Israeli Defense Minister, Ehud Barak, had repeatedly warned that should Hezbollah obtain weaponry that “could break the security balance in the region”, Israel will likely carry out a military operation to prevent the transfer to weapons from Syria to Hezbollah.
