Joe Truzman
The Israel-Gaza War: Who are the Armed Actors Involved?
Joe Truzman - The Israel-Gaza War: Who are the Armed Actors Involved?
- Okay. Hi everybody, we’re going to get started. So I’m very pleased today that we are joined by Joe Truzman Joe is a research analyst at FDDs Long War Journal, focused primarily on Palestinian militant groups and Hezbollah. He also contributes to FDD Center on Military and Political Power. Joe has assisted non-governmental organizations and policymakers in identifying Palestinian groups and their members. He has served on panel discussions looking at Palestinian militant group activity in Gaza, and has provided evidence to investigators at the United Nations on their activities. Joe is regularly cited in news and journal publications around the world, and we could, we won’t, ‘cause I’m not fluent in Spanish, but we could conduct this conversation in Spanish. So, Joe, thank you very much for joining us. Today, I was hoping we could dig in a little deeper on some of the headlines that we may have been seeing around Gaza and around Palestinian militant groups. So, although we’re going to cover a significant amount of the region, let’s start with Gaza, which is obviously featuring in headlines day in and day out. And most of the subjects you will see site Hamas as this kind of one amorphous group that is driving the war that broke the ceasefire, etcetera. But it is more complicated than that. So perhaps let’s start with who are the Palestinian militant groups operating inside Gaza and what’s the relationship between them?
Right, first of all, thanks for having me here. It’s a great pleasure. So yeah, there are a lot of actors involved here, but we’ll focus on Gaza right now. Of course, there’s Hamas, right? They are the common household name as far as when people talk about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is Hamas. They have Islamic Jihad as well, which is an Iranian proxy organization. It operates out of the Gaza Strip, of course, but then there’s a lot of smaller, other smaller groups. Okay? That act as a, I would describe them as a like, like a support for Hamas and Islamic Jihad. In total active groups, at least in this conflict. My assessment would be about a a dozen, right now, a dozen active armed groups that are aligned with Hamas’ ideology and/or are affiliated with Hamas that are fighting Israel right now, either by launching rockets or mortars or fighting against the IDF troops on the ground. And then that’s just about a dozen groups right there. And then there’s other groups not connected to Hamas. They’re the Salafi jihadist groups. These are ultraconservative organizations. Some of them with ties to Al-Qaeda, some of them with ties to the Islamic State, for example. And they don’t regularly clash with Hamas, but they are opposed to Hamas’ rule in Gaza, but they do share one thing in common. And of course that is fighting Israel, right? So I I assess they are involved as well on top of it, 12 other groups. So the Israelis, they really have the themselves a lot to handle in Gaza right now. It’s not just Hamas. And also it’s something important I just wanted to add, that this isn’t new. Israel fighting 12 armed groups or so in the Gaza Strip isn’t new. This happened in 2021, and even before that too. So this is, yeah, this is a regular occurrence, but of course, Hamas dominates Gaza. Hamas is the biggest group, has the most arms, has the most drones, guided missile launchers, things like that compared to any other group. But it’s important to know that there’s about 12 other groups Israel is fighting right now.
And when we talk about Hamas, not so much in the US, but in other parts of the world, people like to make a distinction between what they call the political wing and the military wing of Hamas, which has always struck me as an irony. But can you break down a little, what they may mean when they say that?
Right, so the way, the best I can say is this. So there isn’t a firewall between so-called political side and the military side, and I’ll give you an example. So there is this, I would say he is right up there, maybe number two, number three, man in Hamas, Saleh Al Aruri So he is in charge of the West Bank, or operations in the West Bank, meaning, he’s in charge of launching terrorist attacks in the West Bank. And he is, how Hamas describes him as the deputy chief of Hamas’ Polic Bureau or the political bureau, right? But this is a man that is in charge of carrying out or instructing the soldiers or the terrorists on the ground to commit attacks. So there’s no distinction there between, shouldn’t be a distinction between the military and a political wing. The way I’ve seen it and the way I’ve always seen it is that it’s just, the political side is just a cover. All right? Men or leaders, leaders like Ismail Haniya and others who call themselves political leaders, they’re just trying to shield themselves. These men make, they live most of them live abroad. They don’t live in Gaza anymore. They live lavish lifestyles. And on top of that, they’re out raising money for the terrorist groups, rather for Hamas in Gaza to carry out terrorist attacks. So I don’t see a distinction between a so-called political leader like Haniya or Khaled Meshaal or whoever else, and let’s say a terrorist with a Kalashnikov, right? That is a member of Hamas and Gaza. They all are connected and they all work with each other. So there shouldn’t be a distinction between political and military. They’re the same. And the interesting thing is that we see this not just with Hamas. We see this with Islamic Jihad and other, and smaller Palestinian groups. They try to say that they have a political wing and a military wing, that’s just nonsense. And Hezbollah does the same thing, right? In Lebanon. So they’re all connected. But just the biggest point is that there is not a difference between these political and military wings. They’re all connected, they all do the same.
And when we talk about these groups, what’s the size and is there a difference between being a card carrying member of Hamas in whatever equates to a uniform and a kind of broader part of the Hamas infrastructure. What are the layers of Hamas membership or support look like to the best of your understanding.
Right. There is some open source information about these layers, right? So you have the political, so, and I’m going to say, so-called political leadership because it’s the best way, maybe the viewers can understand this, but the really, again, back to what we were talking about before, there isn’t a difference between political and military, but, so yeah. So there are these layers. So you have the leadership, again, most of them are outside of Gaza. They reside out of Gaza in Qatar, for example, or in Turkey. And then you have some of the, you have other members of the leadership in Gaza, but then you have men like I’m sure your viewers have heard of this, of this person. You have men like Yasin, right? Who is a leader in Gaza. And then there’s, and then you go start going down the hierarchy of Hamas. And then you have spokespeople, right? And others that represent Hamas in different functions. And then you have the soldiers, commanders. You start just keep going down and down and down. So a lot of that information is not available publicly. Hamas doesn’t reveal that for good reason, of course. But that’s just the way it works. Most of the important members of Hamas don’t even live in Gaza. You have, I would say about three members in Gaza or rather, three of the most important members in Hamas are in Gaza. And that’s Yahya Sinwar. You have Mohammed Deif, who is the so-called military leader of Hamas and then you have his deputy Marwan Issa. So I would say those are the three most important people in Gaza, members of Hamas. But then you have, of course, like I was saying, the leadership that is abroad, which makes it really difficult for the IDF, by the way, for Israel to track down, right? Because they want to get rid of Hamas. They want to annihilate Hamas, just remove them. But it’s going to be much more difficult because they’re not just in Gaza, right? They’re in Qatar, they’re in Turkey, they’re in Malaysia, they’re in different areas. So it’s really a difficult task.
And let’s talk about, perhaps, has there been a change in Hamas’ approach in recent years? Do you think there is stock in this, Hamas have been biding their time, they have patients, the 15 years of cash for quiet or whatever exactly we’re supposed to be describing the strategy. Do you see that there was actually a point of change in trajectory? Or is this who Hamas always was?
Right. I think, yeah, just like you said, this is the way Hamas has always been. The thing is a couple of, I guess you could say, a couple changes happened. So for example, the leader Yahya Sinwar, who was released some years ago. I can’t remember what year exactly, but he was released in a Gila Shali Dil, right? Now he went up the ranks after he was released. He ended up becoming the leader of, of Hamas, at least in Gaza. Okay? So his leadership, he brought, I guess you could say a different type of thinking, alright? And it became very important for Hamas, and this is a thing for, in Palestinian society in general anyway, excuse me. But it became important for Hamas to get prisoners, Palestinian prisoners out of Israeli jails. ‘Cause there’s a lot of them and many of them with blood on their hands, many of them convicted of acts of terrorism. So that became a focal point for Yahya Sinwar when he gained, when he became the chief of Hamas in Gaza. So in 2018, maybe some of your viewers remember, or you may remember, there was something called the march of return. The march of return essentially was a about a year and a half long rioting at the security fence or at the border between Gaza and Israel. And much of the rioting was done by Palestinian armed groups, okay? Hamas, Islamic Jihad and others. So when this happened, what Hamas, Yahya Sinwar, was trying to do here was pressure the Israelis, alright? They were pressuring the Israeli, he was pressuring the Israelis to give in to, to send aid, to get money into the Gaza strip, specifically for Hamas, right? To pay their civil servants, to pay and then to spend it on their military apparatus. So ended up actually working. And on top of that, on top of that, they learned how the border fence works, or the weak spots in the border fence, though the same border fence, in certain areas that were blown up on October 7th, that members of Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups were able to cross. So in essence, listen, it’s been a years of patience by Hamas, especially by its leader Yahya Sinwar. But again, everything that happened on October 7th, the brutality, the terrorism that happened, was a clear cut reflection of not only Hamas as an organization and what it is, but of its leader Yahya Sinwar.
In the last 24 hours, there’s been coverage of freelance reporters having entered Israel alongside Hamas fighters in different scopes along the way. Some of them, it’s quite literally on the back of a motorbike, perhaps armed. Others, clearly more at a distance. How do freelance reporters, is that such a thing in Gaza, or is it actually those who are using these reporters from major media outlets are getting the images knowing that these are people associated with Hamas.
Right. This is difficult. I’ll tell you my perspective. So from the years of studying Hamas and other Palestinian groups and so on and so forth, Hamas has a tight grip on what happens in Gaza, especially the media. Okay? So if you’re publishing videos of Hamas fighters or Hamas rockets, they are, without their permission, you’re going to get in a lot of trouble. So that being said, some of the journalists, you call 'em journalists, you can call 'em stringers, you can call 'em whatever. Some of these Palestinians that were, that’s being talked about in this report are pretty well known. I know them, at least from my studies and my research. Some of these reporters are pretty, actually, they’re pretty popular. So they have large followings on social media and such. So anyway, I do recall when, on October 7th, when the attacks were just right after the attacks were happening or during the attacks were happening, you would see there was live video being streamed on Facebook and sent on or published on social media, whether on Twitter or on Telegram and some of these reporters, alright, were there. One of them specifically, I can say I watched him. He was at one of the communities inside of Israeli territory reporting. Now, was he given, let’s say, a heads up by Hamas? It’s probable, but I don’t have evidence of that. But it does raise serious ethical questions regarding how these news organizations use some of these reporters, right? Or journalists in Gaza that have ties to Hamas. I mean, for example, when I say they have ties to Hamas, one of the reporters that is in question, his name is Hassan Aslih. It has become a pretty popular photo now of him, of him receiving a nice kiss on the cheek by Hamas’ chief in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar. So there’s evidence of a link there, right? So yeah, again, it raises serious ethical questions. Now, whether news organizations like CNN, Reuters or the AP or the Associated Press knew about their activities, I can’t say, but again, I hate saying this, but I’m not surprised to see these journalists in this situation or being with members of Hamas or inside of Israeli territory during the attack on October 7th, because they’re well connected and they’ve covered these type of conflicts before. So it wouldn’t surprise me if there was a link with Hamas there. That’s all I can really say about that one.
So looking at the focus Hamas has had over the last few years on tunnels and the desire to bring the main hub of Hamas underground, but also of course under key civilian infrastructure, schools, hospitals, etcetera, do other groups also have tunnel system? Russia today did a expose, I’m not quite sure what the word should be, of one of their journalists in what was actually a Palestinian Islamic Jihad tunnel. Early on, of course, it was confused for Hamas tunnel. But are these, is this underground web of tunnels all part of the terrorist infrastructure, or is actually the predominant focus Hamas?
I mean, you could say a little bit of both, but yes, Hamas, these tunnels, they cost obviously a lot of money. They’re in the millions. They could be more than a million dollars to build one. Okay? So not many groups have that kind of money. Hamas does. Islamic jihad, they do as well. There is evidence of other smaller organizations having tunnels, building tunnels, that have built tunnels as well. However, Hamas and Islamic Jihad are the main ones. All right? And you got to remember, these tunnels are a strategic weapon for these terrorist organizations. Okay? It covers them mostly, mostly from airstrikes, okay? And then in this case, though there is no evidence, but this is the common thought, is that they are also serving, these tunnels serve as a hideout, right? Or rather a place where most of these hostages are being held. And I believe there was a report of one or two of the hostages that were freed that that they said that they were in a tunnel, so that they were being held inside a tunnel. So it’s a strategic weapon, right? So this is very important to ‘em. And on top of that, these tunnels, they run below civilian infrastructure. And the IDF has said this already, and then there’s, there’s evidence to prove this. So they run under hospitals, they run under civilian infrastructure, whether it’s schools. Unrah, for example, there was a tunnel that was found right near this, right near a Unrah school, just in recent years. And I think it was a two years ago, there was a Hamas fighter spokesperson that gave an interview to a news organization inside a tunnel. And by the way, this was all in English. And he acknowledged that Hamas builds tunnels underneath the civilian infrastructure, okay? Okay. So that tells me that Hamas is more interested in keeping themselves protected and not the civilian population above ground.
So you’ve just touched on, Amarah, and I want to talk a little bit about the humanitarian aid that the international communities is looking to bring in and the NGO infrastructure inside Gaza. So, obviously we talked about the tight grip that Hamas has on Gaza. How does that reconcile with the international community’s desire to bring in humanitarian aid? And how have you seen Amarah and the UN in terms of being able to operate independent of Hamas’ wishes?
This is certainly a difficult issue and an an issue that’s happening right now, of course, because the thing is, anything, almost anything that goes into Gaza, Hamas is going to get its hands on it, okay? Whether it’s money, fuel, aid, any of that. They’re going to get their hands on it because they essentially govern Gaza. And they’re so, I would say they’re so, they’re so connected with everything inside Gaza that it’s almost impossible to not have, to avoid them, basically, okay? So there is plenty of evidence out there in past years where not only just Hamas, but members of terrorist organizations in the Gaza Strip have exploited the aid that’s coming into Gaza, specifically food aid. Alright? They would take the food aid and use it for themselves, for instance. We can talk about fuel that’s used for the generators, for tunnels. So there’s a lot. So the problem, the predicament here is for at least NGOs, or let’s just say the United Nations is, okay, what are we going to do? Do we help the citizens of Gaza knowing that Hamas is going to take advantage or are we just going to not do anything? And it seems to me, at least now and in past years, that they’ve, the UN and other NGOs have decided to try to help the people of Gaza, even though there’s very good evidence that Hamas is siphoning that aid, right? For their military apparatus. And of course this is for other groups as well. So it’s a very difficult situation and that just shows you what Hamas is. They don’t care about their civilians. They only care about themselves. I mean, there’s no, why aren’t there any bomb shelters in Gaza? Right? Why is all the money going to tunnels and their military apparatus? It’s a serious question. And it just, just again, demonstrates the mentality of Hamas. They don’t care for their civilians. It’s pretty obvious.
So given you’ve laid out the web, the global web and footprint of Hamas, you obviously, it’s clear that it’s obviously not j just going to be defeated, quote unquote in Gaza. How does the IDF, or more broadly, Israel engage given this huge network and is, obviously Qatar right now plays an incredibly important role for the hostage negotiations. They have also been sheltering the leaders of Hamas for a long time. Obviously, up until a month ago, with Israel’s tacit permission. Do you see that changing going forwards?
Well, there’s certainly efforts, I think, to pressure allies like Qatar or at least American allies like Qatar, and one could say even Turkey, though, Turkey’s pretty, pretty closely aligned with Hamas, right? To try to stop, to not align themselves with Hamas anymore. But I don’t especially given what happened on October 7th, but I just don’t see that happening. So I really don’t have an answer because the problem is, and we’ve talked about it already, is that Hamas is not just in Gaza, right? They’re abroad. So what is Israel going to do, right? Are they going to go after each leader? Are they going to try to arrest them or are they going to try to, what else are they going to do? Right? So this is a very difficult challenge where I don’t think anybody really has the answer. I think for right now, what Israel’s just going to try to do is remove Hamas from Gaza. And something that’s very important as well, that I don’t see many people talking about is that Hamas isn’t, of course we know we talked about Qatar, we talked about Turkey, talked about Gaza, but Hamas is in the West Bank. Okay? And then Palestinian, Ahmed Shahad is in the West Bank, so as the PFLP, so is the DFLP, so on and so forth. And these are all armed groups that coordinate with each other that are aligned with Hamas’ ideology. So what is Israel going to do there, right? We know in July they went, there was a limited, but important operation in Janine, the West Bank where the IDF went after the Islamic Jihad and other groups. But what now? What’s after Gaza, right? Are they going to pivot to the West Bank and get rid of Hamas there? There’s a lot of, again, so it goes back to a lot of unknowns. All right? I think what’s, honestly, what’s happening here is what the Israelis are doing is they’re doing everything in phases. Okay? First we focus on Gaza, okay? And then the next thing what we’re going to do is we’re going to focus on the West Bank, for example. But one thing I know for sure is that, the Israelis are very serious about not having Hamas on its borders anymore. How are they going to do it exactly. That’s another question.
Si you’ve just opened the door to my next area of focus, of course, which is the West Bank. So the last month has obviously been particularly focused on Hamas in Gaza and the Palestinian terror groups there, but you have also seen operations in the West Bank. You’ve seen a significant number of arrests overnight. There was more targeted IDF engagement. What does the representative numbers of Palestinian terror groups look like in the West Bank, and how much control does the PA have in quelling them?
Right, no, very good questions because it connects to everything that’s happening in Gaza and what Israel’s goals are right now, post October 7th. So just a little, a quick background. For about two and a half years now, there’s been a spike in West Bank violence, most of it driven by Iran backed groups. Most of them are actually, all of them, of course are members of Palestinian groups. So Hamas, Islamic Jihad, there’s Al-Aqsa Martyrs brigades, and there’s a few others. I would say about six or seven armed groups that are active fomenting violence in the West Bank over the last two and a half years. So yeah. So this has been a problem and actually a distraction for the IDF, for the Israeli government in the last two and a half years. And I mean, again, like I said before, in July of earlier this year, there was a major military operation. It was limited, but it was, it was in Jenin, but it was a major operation because the West Bank has become such a big problem for the Israelis. For example, the proliferation of weapons, the amount of weapons as far as rifles, and arms is astounding in the West Bank right now, especially in the Northern West Bank. Nablus and other areas. It’s an issue. And on top of that, we have the issue of IEDs. At the very beginning of the violence about two and a half years ago, it was just mostly gunfire. Okay? Again, it was troops, IDF troops, and Israeli border police clashing with members of Islamic Jihad and other Palestinian groups, just, you know, gunfire. Most of it, I would say about 90% of it, 95% was just gunfire.
But now it’s very common to see IEDs and large explosives, large explosive devices, targeting troops. There was a very large raid this morning in Jenine, for example. There’s a lot of explosives used against the IDF troops. So anyway, this is an issue. This is the problem because the longer this violence in the West Bank drags on, the more weapons, different types of weapons, you’re going to be, you’re going to start seeing. Again, we started with the arms, the assault rifles, IEDs. Well, what’s next? We know there has been smuggling attempts or attempts to smuggle in advanced weapons into the West Bank, specifically Claymore mines, right? That’s a concern. Even over the summer, there was this group that called themselves, called themselves the Ayyash brigade, and they launched rockets, well, homemade rockets, it didn’t work, but still they tried. They launched rockets from within the West Bank towards Israeli communities in the West Bank. So we’re seeing that these different type of weapons that are trying to emerge in this violence. So it’s a problem, right, in the West Bank now, and I don’t see like an explosion or like another front opening up during this conflict right now in the West Bank as of today, right? But that’s a that’s a possibility here with the armed groups there. It’s a possibility that just like we’re seeing in northern Israel with Hezbollah and in Southern Israel where the Houthis from Yemen are launching drones and rockets at Eliat, we could see another front opening in the West Bank by these armed groups. So it’s a concern because what Israel is trying to do is they’re managing the fronts, in the north and the south in the east, because they want to concentrate on Gaza.
And I know it’s not your area of focus, but obviously there has been increased settler violence in the West Bank as well over the last two and a half years. How is that making life more complicated in terms the IDF response and the need to offer protection to settlers in the West Bank, but also how is it affecting the partnership with the Palestinian Authority Security Services?
Right, yeah, it isn’t my focus, but what I can say, what I’ve come across is just a quick note. These acts of settler violence in the West Bank is, I would say giving fuel to the armed groups in the West Bank to commit attacks, okay. To, let’s say, commit a drive-by shooting on a Israeli settlement in the West Bank or putting an IED on a highway in with the attempt to try to hurt an Israeli vehicle or damage an Israeli vehicle that’s passing by. So I think settler violence in part is fueling the violence in the West Bank. I can’t go into what the Palestinian authority thinks or the Israeli government thinks, again, because it’s not my area of focus, but at least from, what I can definitely tell you from what I’ve seen from the perspective of the armed groups in the West Bank.
So in terms of the tunnel infrastructure, is there any concern that the tactics of Hamas in Gaza have been imported over to the West Bank?
Yeah, there have been some, I wouldn’t say they’re not, they’re not like the tunnels that we see in Gaza, but in Janine, for example, there is some evidence of some tunnel infrastructure, right? But it’s nothing near what they, what Hamas is doing in Gaza. But we do see some, I would say co-opting of tactics between the West Bank groups and the Gaza groups. For example, well, I would say a couple of, just at the beginning, of the violence in the West Bank, the armed groups developed this strategy. The West Bank armed groups developed this strategy. They called it, they actually formed a joint operations room. What basically means it’s just a grouping of Palestinian terrorist groups, which then they start, which allows them to, enables them to coordinate with each other, okay? And we have the very, something very similar, or the Palestinian terrorist groups have something very similar in Gaza. So I see some of that happening, right? But also something I think is very important as well, is just to mention is that, the almost daily violence or daily clashes with IDF troops in the West Bank, between the Palestinian terrorist groups and the IDF troops is that these armed organizations, these terrorists are learning how the IDF troops, IDF operates in the West Bank. They’re gaining experience from fighting IDF troops on almost a daily basis. That’s a problem, right? That’s a problem for the IDF because these guys are gaining experience, they’re realizing how the IDF works. And so they become a better adept at fighting the Israelis. And on top of that, the armed groups are coordinating with each other. Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Al-Aqsa Brigades, and a few others. They’re all coordinating with each other when they want to clash with the Israeli troops that are coming into Jenine or Nablus or Tulkarm.
So it’s a concerning trend for the IDF and I’m seeing, but, and unfortunately, and we have a PA, the Palestinian Authority that’s weak, that as little influence here, right? I noticed in it was about September, 2021, that there was a huge problem in the West Bank, right? So if I noticed it, the way I think is that, oh, the Palestinian Authority probably noticed it as well, right? That there was a surge in armed groups, armed group activity in the West Bank. And what these groups are doing is they’re undermining the PA from the beginning. They’re undermining the PA’s authority in the West Bank. But the PA didn’t do anything. They just sat there, they watched it, they watched what was going on, and let the Israelis do the hard work. Yeah, there were some arrests here and there of Hamas and Islamic Jihad members, but it was, it was nothing, right? Earlier this year, there was an uptick of PA arrests of Islamic Jihad members and Hamas, which was a good thing, which is nice to see, of course. But it was just far too little, far too late. The PA, they’re kind of stuck in a tough spot because they’re weak. They don’t have influence. On top of that, if they go after Hamas and Islamic Jihad, they’ll be seen as, they’re seen as traitors when it comes to the Palestinian Street, they’ll view the PA as traitors or that they’re doing the Israelis bidding, right? And they obviously, they don’t want that, the PA doesn’t want that, but on top. But the problem is that these groups are undermining ‘em anyway, so what do you do? So this is a problem for the PA, but they haven’t done much about it. And they’re, again, that’s why the Israeli, the IDF, the Israeli border police have to go into places like Jenine and for these anti-air operations, because the PA is simply not doing their job.
So over the last four weeks, the big concern both for Israel, but also for the US has been what happens if Hezbollah decides this is the moment to join the war. And the kind of layman’s descriptions is that the Hezbollah capabilities is 10 times that of Hamas, and that it would be a very different scale of threat. Can you break down what that means and what Hezbollah’s capabilities look like in comparison to those of Hamas and associated groups in Gaza?
Right. So essentially, the way I would put it is all the groups in Gaza all put together are pale in comparison to what Hezbollah can do. All right? So Hezbollah has advanced weaponry. They have, I think the number varies, between a hundred thousand, 150,000 rockets. Some of them have, are precision guided, meaning that they’re not dumb rockets. If they want to, let’s say if Hezbollah wants to target a specific sensitive installation in Israel, the demon nuclear reactor, for example, just as an example, of course, they’ll be able to do that with precise missiles, not like what you see in Gaza where they’re just firing in a certain direction and whatever they, whatever the rocket hits, it hits. So Hezbollah has the capability, precision, capability, capability with rockets. And they also have advanced, they have air defenses that are much more advanced than what the Palestinians have in Gaza. They have anti-ship missiles as well. So that poses a huge problem for these Israeli navy and including the American Navy that’s in the Mediterranean right now. And then of course, they have tens of thousands of fighters, and some of them are specialized fighters, like, like commandos, all right? They’re called the Ran Wan unit and they pose a significant problem for the Israelis. So yeah, this is why these Israelis and it’s allies are very concerned about a regional war breaking out about Hezbollah actually joining the conflict right now. Because right now, what we’ve been seeing over the last month, Hezbollah has been attacking Israeli targets, right? BUt it’s been at a level, it’s been at a threshold, it hasn’t met a tre, it’s been under this threshold of an all-out war. Okay?
They’re only, most, I’d say the majority of their attacks are just at the Lebanon Israel border. You’re not seeing Hezbollah attack Jerusalem, you’re not seeing Hezbollah bombing Tel Aviv, for example. And then the IDF reciprocates. You’re not seeing the IDF bombing Southern Beirut, right? The Hezbollah stronghold in southern Beirut or deep into Lebanon. We’re seeing that because that’s what’s happening right now, just because they’re both sides are trying to manage this. They don’t want, at least for right now, at this moment, a war to break out in the North. So, but yeah, but Hezbollah absolutely is of the strongest actors in the region. And the Israelis and the Americans and other allies should definitely be concerned if Hezbollah actually joins the war. 'cause right now, this is what’s happening in the northern border, this is a very small glimpse into what Hezbollah can do.
And when we talk about Hezbollah, Hamas, etcetera, is there any idea of the size of membership of Hezbollah, and you know, there has been reference in the past of other groups firing rockets normally the much shorter range ones at the border of Lebanon. So who else is in the mix there,
Right. Yeah, this is a great question. So I think Hassan Nasrallah said that he, that there was about a hundred thousand fighters in Hezbollah. But you know, that could be an exaggeration. I couldn’t tell you exactly how many. In the tens of thousands for sure. But the actual, provable data, it’s difficult to say. However, they do have a very large membership. So, but let’s talk about other groups, right? So during this war, we’ve seen some evidence of other armed groups involved here. So Hamas. Hamas’ is branch in Lebanon, Islamic Jihads branch in Lebanon have claimed responsibility for attacks from Lebanon into Israel. All right? So they’ve been either rocket attacks or attempted infiltrations from Southern Lebanon into Northern Israel. So, and the interesting thing here is that with Islamic Jihad, not only did they make this claim, but they published the names of their fighters who were killed by Israeli Israeli forces trying, by Israeli forces when they attempted to infiltrate into Israel. And the interesting thing is that these fighters were Syrians. And so it shows you, there’s some evidence there that there’s foreign fighters entering this conflict. And we know that, the Islamic Jihad is a Syrian branch as well. So that’s not a revelation. It’s not huge news. It’s not nothing really new. But still, it’s interesting, there’s other groups as well.
There’s a Syrian group, for example, for example, Imam Hossein Division, oh, Imam Hossein Division, which is a Syrian, basically a Syrian branch of Hezbollah that the IDF has said that, IDF has said that this group has entered Lebanon and is fighting the Israelis on behalf of Hezbollah. I haven’t seen evidence of it other than the claim that the IDF has made a few days ago or last week, but still interesting. And it brings up again, the concern that other groups are seeing an opportunity to fight Israel, whether it’s in Lebanon, whether it’s in Syria or like the Houthis in Yemen. So they’re taking their shots at Israel, right? And again, the concern is that a regional war breaks out, and we are seeing Iran back groups in Iraq and in Syria, attack American bases or American bases in Syria and Iraq over the last weeks, which has been a big concern. And another reason why there could be a regional war breaking out here. So Israel’s not the only one trying to manage the fronts here. The Americans are doing the same. And it all goes back to Iran. Most of these groups are tied to Iran in one way or the other. Either they’re a proxy or they’re a client. They receive funding, they receive weapons. So again, like I said, most of this goes all the way back to Iran.
So let’s talk about Iran now in terms of the different level of support, guidance, training, engagement, whatever the appropriate words are that they give to these different groups. How would Iran engage differently with Hamas and say it may do with Hezbollah, and how is Iran repositioning or viewing the US warships and response in terms of keeping the northern border quieter?
Right. I’ll answer the second question first. The way I see things is that Iran is tied to the October 7th attack. That they funded these groups, funded Hamas to carry out the October 7th attack. Okay? So that’s my position. So I don’t think Iran or Hamas or any other group expected the Biden administration to come to the aid of Israel or to send these warships to the Mediterranean so quickly. You have to look at the past, right? In previous conflicts, 2021, 2014, we didn’t, didn’t see this type of support from the Biden, from the American administration. So I don’t think they expected that, okay? So it probably threw them off. It probably threw Iran off and Hezbollah off. So maybe it caused them to rethink twice about what plans they had post October 7th, specifically Hezbollah attacking Israel. So I think that’s very interesting. And then remind me of your first question, forgive me,
Is Iran’s support for Hamas and Hezbollah equal and the same, or do they engage with the two groups differently?
Right, right. So this is the interesting thing about Hamas. They are, and Palestinian groups in Gaza, and you could say the West Bank, they’re a little bit different compared to the rest of the axis of resistance. Axis of resistance, meaning the Iran led groups in the region that are attacking Israel, whether they’re Hezbollah or Syrian groups, or the Houthis in Yemen, Iraqi groups, so on and so forth. So the Palestinians are a little bit different in Gaza, in the West Bank, meaning that they’re different in the sense that they can’t receive arms like their comrades or the other groups in the axis of resistance because they have, well, there’s the Israelis, right? They’re going to thwart at least a good percentage of the smuggling attempts. So what does Iran do in this situation? What do the Palestinians do? So they learn how to manufacture weapons, they learn how to manufacture rockets, they learn how to manufacture drones and other weapons. They even have a sub, a small, they call it a torpedo. I don’t know what you want to call it, maybe a submersible submarine type of weapon where I’m assuming it’s guided by GPS where it can hit a maybe an Israeli oil drilling platform or a ship. Regardless, this is the problem for Hamas, right? So if they can’t, they have to know, they have to learn how to make these arms. And what, so what Iran has done is they passed this military know-how, they transferred, how to do this, this technology as far as how to do it or how to produce it in mass. They transferred it to Hamas. And honestly, and rather, this isn’t a surprise. The Hamas and other Palestinian groups, they’ve hinted about this for years now. They’ve said something to the likes of the fingerprints of Qasem Soleimani, who used to be the IRG seed’s, the Kutz force chief, his fingerprints are on these weapons.
So meaning that the Iran helped transfer the know-how, how to make these weapons to the Palestinian armed groups. So this is why now we’re seeing over the years, we’re seeing these long range rockets from Hamas that can reach Eliat, that can reach Haifa, that can reach Jerusalem and beyond. And on top of that, which is just as concerning, is the proliferation of drones in the Gaza Strip and different types of drones. There’s reconnaissance drones, there’s these so-called kamikaze drones that were used in all the October 7th attack. And it’s not just Hamas that has it, Islamic jihad has these drones as well, and smaller groups has have these drones, not as many, of course, but we’re seeing these advanced weapons, right, in Gaza that we didn’t see, let’s say, oh, I would say not even 10 years ago. So it’s definitely becoming an issue. And this military knowhow, right, is being put to use in Gaza. Instead of only relying on smuggling of weapons into the Gaza Strip, now they’ve learned how to produce these weapons, which is a bigger problem for the Israelis.
So today, as there has been on and off for the last few weeks, there was also sirens in Eliat. There has been declarations of war made by the Houthis in Yemen, and a strong statement, I think in the form a dance put out by them. For those of you who haven’t seen it on X, it might be the only amusement you get today. And do you view that as kind of a real threat, an annoyance? Now that the Arrow technology exists, is that good enough to protect Eliat from some of the rockets that may come from Yemen? How do you calculate that?
No, it’s definitely, it’s a threat for sure, more than an annoyance. I mean, there was, and we don’t know yet, but there was also a drone that, an apparent drone that exploded a lot earlier today as well. And we don’t know if it was from the Houthis or something else, but we know that the Houthis have been trying to send drones and cruise missiles from Yemen towards Eliat, okay, in the last few weeks. So it may be that may have happened again. And also we have the announcement of the arrow being used, the arrow ballistic, anti ballistic missile system used against Houthis cruise missile. So yeah, it’s absolutely concerning, I think. And what’s happening, again, I said it before, it all goes back to Iran. There is right now, and this is something we really haven’t seen in previous years, which is concerning, is that we’re, Israel is in a multi-front war, right? And this is a problem. And what the Israelis are doing, again, like I’ve said before, is managing, they’re just managing the fronts. You’re not seeing, at least that we know of in open source reporting despite these attempts by the Houthis, we’re not seeing, we’re not hearing about, we’re not seeing or reading reports about these Israelis bombing Yemen, right? We’re not seeing any of that because so far, either they are just, again, choosing to manage it and just not do anything about it, or they’re just waiting for an opportunity to strike. So that may happen, but yeah, it’s definitely a problem. But we’re not seeing, thankfully, we’re not seeing the other fronts, West Bank, Syria as well, Lebanon, or let’s say the Houthis in Yemen, we’re not seeing a massive amount of firepower being, being brought towards or being shot at Israel, which is a good sign, right?
That’s what we want to hear. That’s what we want to see. We don’t want to, like Hassan Nasrallah, he had his speech some days ago, everybody was very tense about it because they thought it was going to be a declaration of war. Thankfully it wasn’t. He just drew red lines and said what he said and that was it. So it wasn’t a declaration of war. And then now we have another one, another Hassan Nasrallah speech coming in the next few days. So we’ll see what he says there. So so far all these fronts, they’re active, but it’s not a nightmare scenario, right? Israel is managing well right now, but that can change at any moment.
So obviously Iran has a significant number of proxies in the region that it can activate. Yemen might not have been up there on somebody’s kind of top three Trump cards to jump in. What other actors do you think should cause concern? And obviously overnight, there was reports from Brazil that the Israeli security services and the Brazilian security services had averted an attack against Israelis and Jews in Brazil. We know from previous targeting of Israelis around the world that Iran has significant proxies it can activate in many regions. So perhaps you can just zoom out for us on where else should be of concern,
Right. Earlier this summer, I published a, I guess you could call it a visual of nineteen, nineteen one nine, Iran backed groups on Israel’s borders. Okay? That’s just on Israel’s borders. So split them into like, what country they were in. So yeah, so there’s about 19, at least on Israel’s boards, 19 groups. Some of them are Iraqi groups, some of them are Syrians, and so on and so forth, Yemen, the Houthis, but there’s also this problem as well, and you mentioned it, is that this war, this conflict that Israel is in, let’s say with Hezbollah for example, it doesn’t necessarily mean it’s going to happen in, in Israel, right? Latin America or Brazil. They’re a major hotspots for Hezbollah, Hezbollah activity, the Triborder area. So this is a significant problem, not only for Jewish targets, but embassies, right? And not just in Latin America. I mean, there’s history there, there’s the bodegas bombing some years back that was orchestrated by Hezbollah against Jews. And then there’s other countries as well, like in Indonesia, where Israeli embassies have been previously targeted. So this is not just an Israel thing or a Lebanon thing, this can be worldwide as we know already. So this is why and before, by the way, before these attacks, before the October 7th terrorist attack, there were many attempts by the IRGC to hire or co-opt, I guess mercenaries, you can call them, to attack Jewish targets, right? In Cyprus, for example, in the European countries in Turkey, right? So this isn’t new for the Israelis, and certainly not new for the Iran and the IRGC. So this is going to continue to be a problem, right? Especially during this war. So again, all eyes on Gaza, Lebanon in that area, but something could absolutely happen in another country.
So Joe, with our last question, I want to try and look to the day after in Gaza. There’s been a lot of discussions about what strategy the Israelis may or may not have, the Americans. Yesterday the Americans acknowledged they expect a long-term security presence in Gaza by the Israelis. Naftali Bennett has been in the US this week talking about a one kilometer buffer zone that goes inside Gaza. What are you hearing and reading and what do you think may be practical given the urban nature of Hamas and the densely populated garden?
Right, this is a question I’ve been asked a lot. I don’t think anybody really knows, to be quite honest with you, what’s going to be the day after, okay? Because let’s say, let’s say the Israelis achieve their objective, right? Let’s say they get rid of Hamas. Hamas is gone. They don’t have arms anymore. They’re so-called military wing or soldiers or whatever you want to call them, they’re gone. So what next are you going to govern Gaza? Well, no, I don’t think the Israelis are interested in that. So then you think, okay, well who could be a successor to Hamas? Something I’ve heard, Palestinian authority, for example Mahmoud Abbas, but then you say, well, wait a second, if Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian Authority, if they can’t govern the West Bank effectively, what makes you think they’re going to be able to do it in Gaza, right? So again, I don’t think that’s a viable solution to what’s happening in Gaza to moving the, let’s say having the PA govern. Because right now the problem with what’s happening is that there’s no alternative leadership here. Nobody, they don’t want, obviously Israel doesn’t want Hamas, I don’t think the PA can do it. There are some Palestinian leaders, like Dahlan, for example, that have been exiled that are not in Gaza or the West Bank anymore, but I don’t think they want to rule over Gaza. So what are you going to do? The Israelis can’t leave Gaza because then it’ll just be taken over again by another armed group, right? That’s what happens. There’s no leadership, there’s no governing authority in a space like Gaza or any other space. Bad guys are going to take over, right? So it’s difficult to say. I don’t really have an answer for you because I just don’t think anybody really knows what’s going to happen and who can do it, who’s going to step up. Maybe a coalition of Arab partners may govern Gaza. That’s a possibility. But I don’t think anybody wants to touch this, I don’t think anybody wants to go into Gaza and try to govern there, to be quite honest with you, because the situation is just so bad on so many levels. So fortunately I don’t really have a great answer for you for that one.
Joe, thank you. I know we’ve just covered a huge amount of ground in the last hour and I really appreciate it. For those of you who want to dig a little deeper, you can check out a lot of Joe’s interviews and writings on the FTDs website, but also he’s very active on X. And so I would recommend a follow in order that you get your breaking news on Palestinian militant groups. It’s a exciting topic. So Joe, thank you very much and we really appreciate you joining the lockdown family.
Appreciate, thank you for having me.