A Monday strike on the southern Lebanese city of Sidon destroyed a car and killed three people within. At the time, the IDF said they believed Hezbollah operatives were in the area, but they didn’t immediately claim that the actually hit Hezbollah.
That’s changed, and now they’re purporting that everyone in the car was a Hezbollah member, including the one who the IDF said was a member of Lebanese Army intelligence. That person was identified as Warrant Officer Ali Abdullah.
This narrative is in keeping with long-standing IDF allegations that effectively everybody in Lebanon is in some way secretly in league with Hezbollah, though as usual they offered no evidence for the claim. That presents multiple problems.
Car destroyed in Sidon | Image from X
The Lebanese Army was quick to reject the claim that their member was in any way a part of Hezbollah, and indeed they poked holes in the allegation, noting that Abdullah was in no way a member of Army intelligence in the first place, but rather was part of the anti-tank brigade.
Hezbollah was also quick to dismiss the claims, saying they had no affiliation with anyone in the Lebanese military. Defense Minister Michel Menassa issued a statement slamming the Israeli allegations, saying it amounted to a “malicious attack” on the Lebanese Army as an institution.
The IDF often makes statements regarding their strikes that don’t include any actual evidence, and while they are uncritically reported by the Israeli press, there are reasons to doubt their validity. For instance, the IDF has claimed effectively everyone killed in strikes on Lebanon was Hezbollah, though the UN has confirmed that at least 127 of those killed were civilians.
