the focus of world detention has shifted north of Gaza in recent days to the intensifying conflict between the Lebanese militants Hezbollah and Israel one that's seen a the IDF deal a significant blow to the Shia islamist group on Tuesday and Wednesday the destination on mass of pages used by its members then walkie-talkie communication devices exploding killing dozens injuring thousands more a threat of apprisal from its leader hashan nzala on Thursday the group ramping up its missile attacks on Northern Israel Friday killing of two Elite commanders by the IDF among dozens of people who died in
Israeli air strike in Beirut and this weekend one where there have been attacks of Hezbollah Rockets reaching further into Israel well let's go in a moment to our correspondence on both sides of the Border first let's hear from the Israeli leader speaking today this is Benjamin Netanyahu in recent days we have landed a series of blows on Hezbollah that it could have never imagined if Hezbollah did not get the message I assure you that it will get the message we are determined to safely return our residents to their homes in the north no country can
tolerate attacks on its citizens attacks on its cities and we the state of Israel will not tolerate it either we'll do whatever it takes to restore security today has also seen the funeral of the most senior Hezbollah Commander killed in Beirut strike on Friday Ibrahim akill let's go to Beirut James Andre has been following events the only uh broadcast team actually reporting from the funeral we've also got Iris macka our correspondent in Jerusalem as well great to have you both on the program let's start with you James bring us up to date with what you've
been seeing today what's been happening yes well in fact we were at the very end of that funeral where in fact the body of ibraim Akil was taken inside this building which is uh the uh martyr's Cemetery of Hezbollah in that area which is called Raba which is Rob Robi sorry which is very much inside the stronghold of heah in the southern part of Beirut now there were thousands of people Hezbollah supporters militants but also uh armed people from uh the uh the movement who were present to pay their respects for to uh ibraim Akil
thousands of people we saw the coffin go from hand to hand with everyone trying to actually put their hands on that coffin before indeed the body was taken out of the coffin on arrival uh placed in a tomb and the coffin was taken away as per tradition uh in the shii uh religion so uh it was a moment of course which was very tense on the many levels we spoke to uh high ranking security commanders there at the scene who were telling us that well they were rather weary they admitted that saying that indeed they
were worried that there could be a strike by Israel at that precise moment they said you know this is totally possible and also what was very interesting is to see that name cassm who is the number two of Hezbollah who is an incredibly important person in the organization who was also it was believed at the very first in the very first place uh the aim of that strike by Israel a couple of days ago that indeed killed Brahim ail while he actually came out in public for a statement and in that statement he said that
uh Hezbollah vowed retaliation for these attacks on the movement in the in the previous days and also said that for him this was a new phase opening and I quote he said from now on it is all out War so of course uh that is probably very worrying to a lot of people here in Lebanon that's very interesting especially also just getting that information being there today as you say the only broadcaster uh reporting from the funeral watching what was going on there Iris just listening to James one thing that strikes me Jim has been
talking over the past couple of days about how ibraim ail had been injured in the pager attack also this meeting was going on between Hezbollah officials when they were hit on Friday there's been more intelligence more sources coming out on your side of the board and also from Arabian sources too about what actually happened in terms of the Israeli operation yes we're hearing from intelligence sources uh that this meeting was decided you know Hezbollah has acknowledged that it has a problem um so much information leaking every which way they are holding investigations they brought someone
from Iran to hold help them with these investigations so they decided they had to have a meeting of their top commanders and it turns out that the site for that meeting and the time of that meeting was only agreed on Thursday on Friday Israel knew where the meeting was what time it was being held and struck at that meeting along with Ibrahim Akil and Ahmed wahabi there were 14 others so 16 of the top hisbah commanders killed in one raid the information known to Israel so simply in um in intelligence terms this is a a
huge win the question of course is whether this wi can be translated into a military win you know we heard from shikan nah that H that Hezbollah was disoriented but not deterred so uh the question is whether Israel can turn that into an actual military wi and achieve its aims of getting its 65,000 displaced citizens back to their homes in the north James what's your view just listening to the Intelligence on the Israeli side what interests me as well is quite interesting about a kind of deja vu here a lot of analysts picking up on
the fact that when there was a significant attack on a previous Hezbollah uh member to which Hezbollah continued to fire missiles almost a rotating P every day until they'd worked out a moment for reprisal revenge in the words of Hasan nazala is that what we're seeing here the group re kind of regrouping itself and continuing to fire well what was quite interesting in their speech today by name km is that he said that what happened in the previous days and this attack by Israel was a blow to the organization which is quite remarkable that they
actually recognize this this is quite rare and he said that we were shocked I quote but he said now we're regrouping and we're going to fight back now it is true that you have to imagine how much of a blow this is to Hezbollah because if you look at the timeline of events basically you know it started uh with the pager attack in which thousands of people were injured scores were killed where a lot of the younger members also of the Armed part of Hezbollah were holding these pages and had basically their hands ripped off
and were blinded and they're now you know recovering from those wounds on the other hand uh the second day at the funeral of those who were killed with a pager attack well the radios exploded so basically the message there from Israel was we can reach you anywhere and your Communications are completely compromised then a couple of days later you have this meeting covert meeting in the basement of a building uh which was a meeting between the top brass of hezbollah's armed forces that is a meeting that usually would not occur because of course they have
no communication system they had they so they had to meet in the flesh and indeed Israel demonstrated that they had the intelligence that this was going on and that they were able to strike extremely rapidly in uh in in less than an hour destroying that whole building and collapsing it now massive collateral damage of course 45 people were killed a majority of civilians but it is of course an important tactical win for uh Israel and of course it has decapitated to an extent Hezbollah but it's Hezbollah is a very big organization 45,000 members according to
CIA 20,000 of which are indeed military personnel who are trained and ready to for combat Iris just listening to that I think one thing just a brief thought from you on this the rhetoric from Hezbollah the kind of planning that James intelligence that James was pointing out from an Israeli point of view I think a lot of people will be listening to the rhetoric used by Benjamin Netanyahu today what should we read from that I think um what we're seeing is a game of poker a deadly game of poker with both sides uh upping their
bids so it is an escalation neither side yet using its full uh Arsenal military Arsenal uh very strong on the rhetoric you know open-ended Day of Reckoning from um sheim kasum from Netanyahu we're going to get you you're going to get this message you know if you don't get this message first we you know we'll repeat it so there's definitely rhetoric there is is also an increase uh in the military attacks and the question is you know let's say it's four four out of 10 five out of 10 can they keep it at five out
of 10 uh without it exploding into nine or 10 out of 10 because if there is a fullscale war with the capabilities that both sides have at this time uh the Reckoning is that there will be thousands if not tens of thousands dead on both sides of the line and I think for that reason alone uh people here including when I say people here Europe the US um a number of international bodies including the United Nations working very hard to see that this does not escalate uh with the risk of that here is thank you
Iris M our correspondent in Jerusalem James thank you to you as well our senior reporter in Beirut James Andre
