Hezbollah could attack Israeli city of Haifa: Israel Defence Minister

Tel Aviv, Jan 31 ( IANS) Israel Defence Minister Yoav Gallant, widely considered a hawk in the Israeli war cabinet, has said that terror group Hezbollah could attack the northern Israel city of Haifa.

In a statement on Tuesday, Gallant said that this could lead to a war and called upon for more comprehensive preparations.

He added that Hezbollah has 150,000 rockets and mortars and could fire potentially up to 8,000 rockets per day.

He warned that this was several levels of magnitude greater than what Hamas was able to do other than for one day on October 7, 2023.

The Defence Minister, who is also a former General of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), said that the rockets of Hezbollah are also more precise, long-range and destructive.

He also added that defence analysts are of the belief that even if Iron Dome maintained an 80 to 90 per cent shoot-down rate, enough rockets would get through the missile shield to do major damage to Haifa and some other cities.

Israeli Defence officials still believe Israel would "win" such a war in the military terms and that unprecedented levels of air force strikes in Lebanon would degrade Hezbollah's rocket power within several days or a couple of weeks.

The defence think-tanks, however, said that but the early firing period would harm the northern Israeli towns, including Haifa, and that Hezbollah could manage rocket fire for longer than Hamas.

The IDF in a statement on late Tuesday night said that it's aircraft hit a Hezbollah command centre and an observation post in the southern Lebanon village of Khiam.

The statement also said that on Tuesday, the Israel Air Force had attacked another observation post and building used by Hezbollah in Ayta ash-Shab and Mhaibib.

Hezbollah only managed to fire one rocket from Lebanon at the Arab al-Aramshe area, which landed in an open area without causing any injuries.

It may be noted that after the assassination of top Hamas leader Saleh al-Arouri in southern Beirut, allegedly by Israel in a drone attack, the Hezbollah Chief Hassan Nasrallah had warned Israel that it would respond in a fitting manner.

However, except for some minor skirmishes and occasional missile fires, there has not been a major escalation of war.