Hizballah drones torch Israeli tanks, with Jon Elmer

you are watching and listening to the electronic intifada. I am John Elmer. This is the resistance report on day 979 of Israel's genocide in Gaza and day 102 of the battle in South Lebanon. I'll be covering Iran uh later on in the program, but let's start as always with Lebanon and this map that's still uh pretty useful map. I reported last week that the Israeli military admitted that they had withdrawn um three of their uh divisions that were fighting inside Lebanon. They were particularly on the coast in Naqoura area that you see by Ada. We watched them leave those places more or less. Um similar in Bint Jbeil. They don't want to have their troops uh sitting ducks to these FPV drones that Hezbollah is using. Um but the real vector for the past 2 weeks has been uh if you follow the blue line around up the Galilee panhandle to the top you see Metula um and Yakhmar. Those are uh that is the zone of battle. Yakhmar is right near the Beaufort castle. You can see the elbow of the Litani river there. Um it's only 4 km from the border of Israel, but Israel made a big deal of it being crossing the Litani, but you can see clearly by this map why it's not that big a deal compared to um where the Litani is uh north of say Bint Jbeil. Um so that is where we're going to be focusing uh today. Let me show you another couple new maps that I pulled for you. These are NASA topography maps, which I think when you watch these videos, you know that it looks like this, but uh I thought I'd bring uh NASA topography to uh bear on this uh on this day's show so you can see um the significant mountainous um and valleys uh in this area that are fighting. The main operations this week are in the upper left corner there, Zawtar. Zawtar al-Sharqiyah Um and then Yakhmar and then to east of uh Yakhmar is the Beaufort Castle, which you could see on that cliff face edge there on the topography. Um also you can see on the right-hand side, it's not ideal the way the border is marked, but you can see the dotted line that is the blue line that marks Israel from uh from Lebanon. Um if you could see down to the left there, you see a town of Markaba. Um this week a unaffiliated lone wolf rode his motorcycle from Beirut down to his village that had been uh ethnically cleansed and uh destroyed. Um and he crossed the border into Israel, scaled uh an Israeli military observation tower, and fired with a handgun uh on Israeli troops before uh he was killed. So, that definitely shook up the Israelis. Um they've been uh you know, touting their military successes in uh the south and somebody uh was able to uh enter Israel uh into the into the Galilee uh enter Israel in the way that Israel had been fearing for decades. Um but that was a a lone wolf operation, so I thought I'd bring that to you. In the next slide, we zoom in a bit so we can get a better um yeah, a better look at the topography in these towns. So, there you see Zawtar al-Sharqiyah on the left there. Um and you see Yakhmar on the right and just above it in that open space with the high ground um on the top uh topography, that is the Beaufort Castle. So, these are the areas that we will see these operations for this program. Um let's take a look at the first operation, an anti-tank guided missile strike. Um we we haven't seen as many of these on camera. These are dangerous operations. Um, they don't have cameras out for them as much, and we haven't seen Almas um, anti-tank guided missiles they that were used in the uh, earlier rounds that had cameras on board. Um, but here you see the Cornet anti-tank guided missile crossing multiple kilometers here to target that tank that you see. This tank is going to intercept part of the missile. You can see the burst from its uh, shotgun blast there. But the Israelis admitted that the commander, the tank commander uh, on that vehicle was killed in that strike. So, obviously uh, the shape charge made it through uh, and torched that tank. That was one of five uh, Israeli soldiers killed in the first 6 days of the month. Um, here we're looking at uh, what we're going to see for the next uh, 20 minutes or so. Just to remind you what we're looking at with these FPV strikes, first-person view means they have a camera on board. You can see the battery pack on top. Um, all component parts that can be um, many of them could be built uh, 3D printed. Underneath you see um, the PG-7VL uh, or the warhead from the RPG. It's a 93-mm warhead. It's a significant single-charge warhead. Uh, anti-tank warhead. And underneath um, that at the very bottom you see the spool of fiber optic cable. We're not sure what percentage of operations are fiber optic uh, and what ones are radio, but the fiber optic ones cannot be jammed. Um, and they give uh, low latency um, sort of instant uh, communication with the pilot and the vehicle. Um, and so those are uh, part of the success of these operations and part of the reason why Israel is so vexed in trying to come up with a solution for them. So, that's what you're going to be looking at for the next little while. Let's look at the first operation number six. This is a four times FPV strike over the course of um about 2 and 1/2 hours in Za'tar al-Sharqiya uh this past week. Again, every video that you're going to see for this entire program has been published by Hezbollah in the last week since you saw me. Um that is the case every week, but uh sometimes it's good to just remind people. So, this is a a reconnaissance flight. This is one of the um tools that this drone has is that uh when you're coming in on your target uh you can basically case the village and find, as you see here, each of their emplacements, the where where they've hidden their vehicles. And here's the strike on a Nammer troop carrier with an engine compartment open. You could see on the right there, that's the engine has been taken out of that vehicle, obviously being repaired, maybe from a previous strike. In any case, here you see it burning. Um this is the drone following up 30 minutes later. So, this is this has been on fire for 30 minutes. Hezbollah is showing you that that is the Nammer that was just hit. There that you can see uh and so that's a battle damage assessment by FPV drone number two. And then it'll carry on to its target here, the Merkava tank, and he's going to go underneath the netting and the sticks. I think they they've been big on sticks for the last couple weeks that uh super protective from anti-tank uh warheads. Um So, he struck that. Now we have FPV three here. He's going to hunt another tank that is pretty well covered. That one is a one of the better um concealments that we have seen for uh these vehicles, but the The doesn't care about your concealment. It's just flies around the back and targets targets the vehicle from behind right in the door in the weakest part of the vehicle. The most uh target rich uh spot to hit the tank. So, all of the effort that the Israelis put into uh shrouding that tank in sticks and netting. And that was even uh tactical netting. This is tactical netting, too. So, it's at least better netting than the fishing nets. But again, uh aiming for the rear door there that you can see they've covered the tank uh with an Israeli flag hopefully identify it while also concealing it. Uh contradictory there. Four operations, two against Namers, two against Merkavas in Za'tarah Shakiya over the course of a 2 and 1/2 hour window one after another. The first flight gets the reconnaissance, gets the target acquisition, and the others follow up knowing where to go and where to strike. Let's look at number seven cuz this is just uh uh this is the single strike on the Namer. You can see the engine open. Maybe we'll loop that one more time around. You can see the engine open. There you see it burning uh 30 minutes later. Here you can see the engine compartment open. So, any kind of compartments being open are going to lead to your vehicle being torched. Um the uh warhead explodes, creates shrapnel and explosion explosive material inside the vehicle which lights it up. Um let's take a look at number eight here. Um this is over the base of Jabal Blatt. I have reported on this a number of times. This is one of the five forward bases that Israel installed inside Lebanon during the ceasefire. We've seen operations here at this what seems like a totally abandoned base all the time. Where is the soldiers? Um, we got a long reconnaissance flight over to see where the targets are, to see if anyone is there before uh coming in and striking uh uh a Merkava tank here that also has a hatch open, which is probably going to make a significant mess as we saw previously with the Namer. There you can see it identifies the tank again under netting that will protect this tank if the drone falls from the sky directly down. But, they don't do that. They fly under the netting. They identify the tank in this little netting garage and then strikes right at the open driver's hatch. So, this is this is sort of the new soldiers in the window from Gaza if people remember back when the Israelis used to hang out in windows. The second half of the genocide, they've been leaving their hatches open and paying the price for that or leaving doors clo- open so that their commanders can be hit. Um, so that is the hit on the open hatch. We can see that on the next slide. Uh, there you see it open. That's the driver's hatch and the engine is in front of him there. Um, and he has access uh to the cabin from his seat as well. Um, let's take a look at number eight. This is a three uh a series of three FPV drones. What you see there on the left is a smoke screen put up by the tank to cover, to conceal uh the dismounting of the troops. So, there you see the soldiers dismounting out of the uh tanks and vehicles moving into the building. So, that smoke screen would also be a good cover if the drones fell directly down from the sky, but they don't. They fly around it uh and come down on ground level and appear to strike that group of soldiers. Um this is the second FPV uh drone coming into the same area. Again, these are often spread out by um 20 minutes, 30 minutes. He's going to pick a tank here. Sorry, he's going to pick a Hummer here and uh hit that in the rear. Again, you can see the netting all over that. And then now we can see again the burning from that strike. This is the fourth uh this is the third drone catching the battle damage about 40 minutes later. And you can see that all around that tank that strike created a fire. Whether it did inside the tank or not is not clear, but it doesn't portend uh promising outcomes when everything around it is burning. Um so you see that from the third FPV drone battle damage assessment. This is what people wanted to see, a second drone that records the damage. This was part of an operation um the same day three APCs and one tank hit. Um let's take a look at number nine. We're going to get a thermal camera image here, night attacks. Again, the Israelis had moved their operations to night believing that Hezbollah didn't have uh thermal capabilities on their cameras and they denied it until uh the very last moment uh last week after four videos came out uh in the same day that I showed you last week. And again, consistent targeting going for the rear door uh of the tank, the weakest spot. So we're seeing really um a concentration of targeting uh data being shared across the front line with these Hezbollah drone pilots. Um because these attacks are hitting the same spots and those are the spots that you want to hit. Um let's take a look at number 10 versus a Humvee here in the riverbed. Again, it's Al-Tawaf Al-Sharqia. And you could see this is a Humvee with communications. It's probably a command vehicle. You can see it bristling with uh antenna here and the back is usually full of that type of gear. You can see the antenna there. Uh and a direct strike on that Humvee that destroyed it. These the Humvees have no chance against this anti-tank warhead. And you can see the computers in there as well, too. So, uh command vehicle in Al-Tawaf Al-Sharqia. Um let's take a look at 11. This is versus a D9. D9s and excavators have been pulled more or less from Lebanon. Um this was the only one this week and Yedio Aeronautics said that the military has sharply reduced the use of heavy machinery such as excavators and bulldozers, which had become easy targets. Um so, that's obvious and they were destroying them in significant numbers. And so, now Israel's ability to do demolition operations in areas where they're not fighting um have dropped because they they don't have guards for these vehicles. These vehicles were getting taken off the battlefield in significant numbers. 12 logistical vehicles in the last week alone taken out of the battle. Um we can take a look at number 12 now. Again, this is a two uh two strike operation. You can see the two tanks facing head-on here. Aiming for the turret gap on these is what the fighters are attempting to do. Looks like that was pretty close. And again, as soon as the warhead touches something, it it it ignites the uh molten dart. That sends it into that uh underneath the turret gap, which is a weaker spot. This is second drone, same operation. Mo- minutes later, usually 30, 45 minutes later, according to field reports. Um presumably when the Israelis are expecting them one after another to keep them spread out like this. Keeps them preoccupied. This is one of 19 FPV anti-tank strikes in the past two weeks. Six of them were this week. This operation uh dates back to the last days of May, so the last two weeks. Um there's been 19 operations again- FPV operations against uh tanks. Um let's take a look at number 13. This is a tank that's guarded by sticks. You can see when it gets in close, it's going to hit it on its skirt. And protected the protective sticks didn't uh it didn't work very well. I don't know what they think they're getting from that. But there's the sticks. There's a good shot of the sticks, protective sticks, volleyball nets, fishing nets. They're just winging it. Uh let's take a look at the next one, 14, against a logistical vehicle. Again, we were talking about these. They're targeting these vehicles um is a significant target. This is a fuel tanker. So all the tanks that uh run out of fuel very fast um are required are based around this single Hemet fuel tanker. Maybe there's multiple ones. Uh but this fuel tanker is going to be exploded and we have seen battle damage from these. They blow sky high. Obviously, you put an anti-tank round into the middle of a fuel tank and you get quite a spectacle. But you also get that off the battlefield. And like I said, 12 logistical vehicles targeted this week. So, double the number of logistical vehicles than tanks this week. So, something to keep in mind as we go forward. And watch this one around. Again, you can see the way he picks the target um and then comes back around, looping around, gets his balance um instead of just diving down instantly on the target. He can get his altitude set. He can get his balance set and allow for better targeting. So, these are all battlefield adaptations that we've been watching um Hezbollah uh gain over the course of this battle and now they are extremely effective in these strikes. So, that is the This is up near Beaufort Castle as well. All in that area. These operations are all in the same area this week. Everything we're showing you. Um let's take a look at 15. This is uh an This is a drone navigating through air strikes and what appear to be artillery strikes. Uh that massive plume's an air strike, but the the secondary burning there that is probably a barrage of artillery shells. Which is how Israel operates. Again, these don't have much impact on the drones. The drone just flies through it. Uh comes back down around the other side to strike the tank. And this is also this week this operation was one of the six anti-tank operations with FPVs. Um but with anti-tank guided missiles, there was 10 uh operations last week against tanks and seven uh this week. So, the same number of anti-tank guided missiles being used as FPV drones. FPV drones get all the attention. Uh let's look at 16. If you look in the upper left there, that's the Beaufort Castle. And you can see in the foreground that Israel has bombed and destroyed this area, presumably did that in the hours before that tank moved into the area. That's how the Israelis operate. And a direct hit there on the turret top. Not sure that's the most ideal place. That's a pretty heavily armored place uh on the tank. Um but we can uh see that it was a direct hit for sure. Um So, are we on 17 now? This is uh Those were the anti-tank operations. These are the rocket operations that also don't get much attention. 89 la- uh last week and 83 this week. So, nearly 200 rocket operations. This is a 32-barrel uh that they just showed you. A 32-barrel uh Katyusha launcher, Grad rocket launcher, 122-mm Grad rockets, but um Iranian versions of the Grad rockets um and basically any rocket of this size in Lebanon has always been called a Katyusha. So, you can see these barrages against Israeli troop positions. And again, 83 of these this week, and that's number of field reports. That's not number of missiles fired. So, this This operation you're watching here with 32 rockets heading out, that just counts as one field report. So, just to keep that in mind. We got another one here that's a uh a bespoke Hezbollah launcher. So, we see here an 18 2 by 9 uh of also uh Grad rockets on the back of like a Bongo van. Uh like a commercial a lightweight commercial truck. Um but, it does its job here. And this is uh an 18-barrel launch versus IDF troop positions in Adissa uh on Monday night. Um 89 of these operations last week, 83 of them this week. Um and these are the backbone of the operations against Israeli troop positions, which keeps them under fire and uh in shelters and off of the battlefield effectively. That gives you a shot of the last one, but I'll give you a still in this next image to show you. Uh the bespoke truck launcher doing its job. That is not uh uh a military-grade vehicle, um but it does the job. And Hezbollah has been using these vehicles, repairing these vehicles, keeping them in the battle uh for this entire fight. So, I wanted to bring those on. And also number 20 here, one-way attack drones. We don't have a lot of time to cover these every week, but these operations I try to bring them in every week or two. Um these operations Sayyad 107 uh attack drones. These are one-way attack drones, suicide drones, kamikaze drones. Um they're programmed the the destination there. Um and they're very accurate. And they are constantly being fired at Israeli troops. Last week, 28 separate operations. Uh this week, 45 separate operations. And you can see that this is a six This is a six-drone swarm. On the field report, that counts as one operation. So, this is one of 45 different operations. So, so you're talking you know, hundreds a week of these are being launched. And you can see the fighters there setting them up. So, that is Lebanon. And just to say a last word, Hezbollah spoke this week about Iran responding to Israel's attacks in Beirut. Uh Hezbollah said on Tuesday that the Iranian missile response to the Zionist entity in defense of our Lebanese people is a message of moral, political, and field-level commitment from the Islamic Republic toward Lebanon after this enemy with full cover from the American administration persisted in committing its crimes against our country and resumed violations in the southern suburb of Beirut uh within the framework of its continuous violations of the ceasefire agreement confirming its disregard for all international agreements. Um and now let's take a look at Iran. again, a lot of fighting this week around the Strait of Hormuz, which you're looking at here. Iran on the north of the map there. Uh the UAE and Oman on the uh actually both sides of those uh are Iran. Uh that's Qeshm Island. That's the area around there, Bandar Abbas, Qeshm Island. That is what has been hit, targeted primarily by the Americans. They're saying they're firing at radars, even though Trump goes uh 10 times a day for the last 2 months saying that they have no radars, but apparently uh they do. Obviously, they do. Um but uh Trump's lies uh always catch up. Um so, those strikes uh all around uh responding to uh what uh the US said was responding to an Apache helicopter that was apparently shot down by a drone. Uh, Iran did not take credit for that operation. Um, CNN said that it was a Shahed 136 drone and that just doesn't seem likely unless it was like literally crossfire. Um, the Apache flew into it, so unclear, but the Iranians are not, um, have not claimed that operation. The Apache crashed, uh, into the water off of Oman and was rescued 2 hours later, uh, by a, uh, by an unmanned surface, uh, vessel. So, the, uh, Americans didn't send rescue forces into the Strait of Hormuz to rescue their pilots. They sent a drone boat to get them to bring them out to a safer area to be put on a ship. So, I think that is somewhat telling. Um, we can take a look at the next, uh, slide is also the Strait of Hormuz, which is gives you a better sense, uh, of the way that, uh, the coast works and how small this area is, um, but also just the advantage that Iran has over these, uh, over the Persian Gulf countries. Kuwait was hit, um, Bahrain was hit repeatedly, um, and Jordan as well in these, uh, Ali Al Salem, uh, airbase in Kuwait was hit, Muwaffaq Al Salti airbase in Jordan. We know that was the one before the war that was bristling with, uh, F-35s. There wasn't even enough room, uh, on the runway for them. The refueling aircraft for this, uh, week of battle have been taking off from Ben Gurion Airport in Israel using them as human shields, um, which Israel always does. Um, and Iran has said that, um, their core position has been the same from the beginning that the ceasefire is a ceasefire on all fronts of the axis unequivocal and so when Israel bombed Beirut Iran responded by attacking Israel and when they attacked Israel they attacked the airbase from which the attack on Beirut took place from and so again Iran is responding to every violation they're targeting appropriately within the rules of engagement that they're setting out with the understanding that this ceasefire period is going to be a protracted period of time the there's a deal in 3 days is not true the negotiations for this will take months and so Iran has been certain that they're not going to lose their strategic advantage by having these attacks take uh things that are being negotiated on off the table because of Israel's facts on the ground or the Americans facts on the ground and that is the way that Israel has always done this Trump said this week boasted this week that 200 commercial vessels had crossed the straight in more than a month in the last more than a month which would normally be 4000 so it's a 95% reduction in transit through through the Strait of Hormuz Trump would probably say something like 12,000% decline let's take a look at some of these missile operations this is uh uh what we have seen for a while that's an Emad medium-range ballistic missile these are they've done heavy lifting um during these strikes you can see them go off in barrages um these strikes were on Kuwait and Bahrain the Ali Al Salem airbase and the fifth Fleet in the fifth Fleet in Bahrain and also key radars in Bahrain at the um Sheikh Isa airbase as well. Um you can see those go up. Those are the what we are used to. We've seen more than a hundred of these now in the past four days of this exchange of fire that we've been seeing. And this next one uh 33 now. Um this is the Iranian Navy um the national Navy uh Islamic Republic uh Navy uh launching uh anti-ship cruise missiles. There that's the Ghader anti-ship cruise missile you're going to see. And here you're going to see an unseen uh Shahed drone that we haven't seen before. This is the Denay. Um there you see it launch there and they said that those were launched at the USS Mason, the USS Truxtun guided missile destroyers um and pushed them out. They were warning shots uh the Iranians said and fired also on the USS Tripoli and the USS Tripoli is where the Marine Expeditionary Unit is stationed. Um and so the Iranian Army said or the Iranian Navy said that these were warning shots to push them uh further out of the Strait. Um week after this there we can look at 34 and see uh the launch of the Kheibar Shekan solid fuel that you're seeing here. Looks a lot like the Palestine 2 uh being launched. So we're seeing the same missiles that we watched during the during the war. Um they're being launched in batches between between a dozen and 30 um each day. So, more than 100, uh, missile, uh, strikes along with drones have been fired this week. Um, this was fired at, uh, Ramat David David Airbase, and that is the airbase where the operation in Beirut took place from. Um, and we know from the Ramat David Airbase that, uh, the IDF was touting 100% interception rate like they always do, and it's always a lie. Um, but open-source information showed damage at a warehouse that was the, uh, home of the Israeli Air Force 157 Squadron, which is a, uh, based at Ramat David Airbase, and it specializes in electronic warfare using armed, uh, reconnaissance, armed and reconnaissance drones. So, uh, that target was hit. The Israelis had to admit it. Uh, the, again, the satellite pictures we get from Israel are extremely hard to read because they're so, uh, low resolution. Um, let's take a look at 35. Um, part of the strikes that Israel retaliated with was, uh, hitting petrochemical, hitting the, um, the Mashar, uh, petrochemical complex, the biggest in Iran. Immediately Israel goes to civilian targets. And so, Iran said, uh, "You'll regret doing that." And they launched, uh, these are Ghader ballistic missiles, uh, in this, um, launch, and they were launched towards the Haifa refinery. Um, so, again, Iran not allowing, uh, staying in control of the escalation ladder, um, and escalation dominance here, firing on logical targets, unlike the Americans hitting water installations, um, or the Israelis hitting, uh, national petrochemical, uh, refineries. Um, the Americans, um, have said that they have tried to keep their, uh, strikes to radar installations and are trying to not kill people. Uh, so it doesn't seem like the Americans really want an escalation. I don't think they have anything to gain by an escalation. They already lost the first war. It's not like if you add another, uh, 20 days of war, the Americans will win. It's actually the opposite. The Gulf states are in a position of virtual existential, uh, battle should they, the war expand to them. Um, and so this is certainly not, uh, a position where where the US or Israel has the upper hand. Of course, Israel wants to, destroy the ceasefire cuz they want to continue their genocidal rampage with full US, uh, support, weapons, and money. Uh, let's take a look at 35, uh, now because they also got a another Reaper drone. This is another Reaper that we've seen and on this show, this is now about 50 that I have shown you between Yemen and Iran. The Americans admit to, uh, indirectly admit to at least 30 being lost to Iran and we know at least 25 lost to Yemen and almost all of them on camera in some way. And one last thing, again, uh, number 36, Yemen joined the battle, uh, this week as well because it's a ceasefire on all fronts. If it's not a ceasefire on all fronts, all fronts are going to participate. Here's a Palestine two ballistic missile being launched at Tel Aviv. Um, presumably being launched at Ben Gurion Airport, which is usually the target there. Um, this was launched by, um, the Yemenis. The Yemenis also announced that they had closed uh, the the Red Sea, the Bab al-Mandab. The Red Sea is closed to Israeli shipping, but that's been happening for 3 years. And I pulled this paragraph from Yedioth Ahronoth in January talking about the closure of the Red Sea to Israeli shipping. And Yedioth Ahronoth said, "Each morning port workers arrive to empty docks ready for ships that never come. Revenue that once totaled 240 million million shekels a year has fallen to zero, while state assistance amounted to just 15 million shekels according to port authorities. The port activity came to a halt in November 2023 after Houthi forces seized the vessel in en route to Eilat. Shipping companies including NYK and Zim subsequently stopped sending ships to the port. The shutdown followed a record year in 2023 when about 150,000 vehicles, this is mostly a vehicle port, 150,000 vehicles passed through the port. Um And by the and now it's zero. And that has happened either way. So, Yemen announced that, but that was already a military objective achieved by the Yemenis. So, that has been the resistance report on day 979 of Israel's genocide and day 100 and two of the battle in South Lebanon.