Hezbollah's new tactic: Old missiles challenge Israel's defences
While the IDF operation is ongoing, Hezbollah fighters continue to launch rocket attacks on Israeli territory, even using ballistic missiles. Here is Hezbollah's most powerful weapon.
Hezbollah fighters notoriously bombard Israeli territory using rockets or drones; however, more ballistic missiles have recently been appearing. Below, you can see the launch of a Qader-2 missile, a variant of the Iranian Zelzal-2, from a deeply situated underground bunker somewhere in Lebanon.
Such missiles are currently unnecessary for Iran as their range is estimated to be about 200 kilometres. This is far too short for Iran but sufficient if launched from Lebanese territory. For example, Tel Aviv and Beirut are approximately 210 kilometres.
Zelzal-2 - A modified reincarnation of Soviet-era missiles from the 1960s
Iran has been supplying these missiles to Hezbollah since the early 2000s, according to Nicholas Blanford, who describes in his book "Warriors of God: Inside Hezbollah’s Thirty-Year Struggle Against Israel," among other things, the process of acquiring these missiles through Syria.
Structurally, these are unguided ballistic missiles derived from the Soviet Luna-M. The Zelzal-2 is a missile with a calibre of 61 centimetres and a launch weight of 3,400 kilograms, carrying a warhead weighing up to 590 kilograms. Such a large payload is necessary due to the very low accuracy that allows targeting only entire neighbourhoods in cities.
These were among the first Iranian ballistic missiles developed in the 1990s, which are now practically obsolete and significantly inferior to the new arsenal. Therefore, it is unsurprising that Iran decided to "scrap them in combat" through Hezbollah's hands.
Nevertheless, these old missiles pose a significant problem for Israel, as intercepting such a missile requires engaging the Arrow-3 or David’s Sling anti-ballistic system, where a single intercept missile costs a few million dollars. This action is intended to cause a shortage of interceptor missiles for the Israeli missile defence shield, which is also supported by the American THAAD system and destroyers with SM-3 missiles.
Iran has already attacked Israel twice with dozens of ballistic missiles, and after the last Israeli retaliation, it is expected to do so a third time with an even greater number of ballistic missiles.
