(Communicated by the IDF Spokesperson)
On the evening of October 12, 2009 a large explosion took place in the house of a senior Hizbullah member which was being used as an arms cache in Tayr Filsay, a village approximately 15 km east of the coastal city of Tyre and south of the Litani River. During the explosion, a number of people were injured, including the home's owner, Said Issa.
Following the explosion, Hizbullah began to remove the remaining weapons from the cache, isolating the scene and preventing UNIFIL or LAF (Lebanese Armed Forces) access.
Pictures taken by an UAV of the Israeli Air Force after the explosion of a Hizbullah weaponry warehouse on Monday (Oct. 12) in Tyre in southern Lebanon, show Hizbullah operatives smuggling Katyusha rockets and other weaponry out of the destroyed warehouse into another one in southern Lebanon.
The video filmed by the UAV that was directed to the location of the incident after the explosion, clearly shows a large number of people arriving at the scene and loading Katyusha rockets and other weaponry onto trucks. Afterwards they cover the weaponry in order to hide it and drive with it to another weaponry storage in the village of Dir Kanun A-Nahar, where they unload the weaponry. Later Lebanese army and UNIFIL forces are seen arriving at the site of the explosion.
Similar to the prior incident at Khirbit Salim, the LAF failed to respond quickly to the event. The Hizbullah then moved the weapons to another arms cache in the village of Dir Kanoon a-Nahar, 3 km southwest of Tayr Filsay. A large truck was used to transfer the weapons, which, based on the size of the truck, likely included rockets or rocket launchers. In an attempt to divert responsibility to Israel, Hizbullah said that the explosion was a result of an Israeli shell left from the Second Lebanon War.
This is yet another manifestation of the ongoing violations of UNSCR 1701 in Lebanon in the past four months (Khirbit Salim, July 14), reflecting Hizbullah's continued operations in Southern Lebanon despite UNIFIL efforts. Hizbullah's deployment throughout southern Lebanon relies on exploiting local civilian infrastructure to conceal military infrastructure.