Israel targets Hezbollah’s history while missing its present: The Complete Dismantling of Unit 910

By Elijah J. Magnier – 

Israel has now reached a stage in its war with Hezbollah where every member or commander – regardless of rank or current operational role – is considered a legitimate target. Whether driving or walking down the street, sitting with their families or in civilian buildings, Hezbollah operatives are now marked for assassination. Civilian casualties are increasingly dismissed as collateral damage, a price Israel, backed by unlimited US support, is willing to pay in the absence of full deterrence and amid Hezbollah’s calculated decision to avoid open confrontation.

This shift in Israel’s rules of engagement is forcing Hezbollah back into the shadows. Members at all levels are returning to the movement’s roots: clandestine methods, modest lifestyles, strict operational silence, drastic reforms and a renewed focus on domestic Lebanese objectives. What was once a self-confident, semi-public resistance must now adopt the posture of a covert, underground force.

From Israel’s perspective, any Hezbollah figure – past or present – remains fair game, especially those who once vowed to fight Israel and pray in Jerusalem. But there is growing speculation that Hezbollah may have quietly moved away from this broader doctrine. Its operational focus now appears to be limited to the liberation of Israeli-occupied Lebanese territory, a position rooted in Article 51 of the UN Charter, which guarantees the right of self-defence, as well as numerous UN resolutions affirming the right of populations to resist occupation, with or without explicit state support.

A recent Israeli assassination underscored this evolution – and exposed serious flaws in Israeli intelligence. The killing of Hassan Bdeir was not a precision strike against an active threat. Once a key player in Hezbollah’s foreign operations, Bdeir had been inactive for a long time since returning from Syria several years ago. Marketed as a strike against a Hamas-Hezbollah plot against an Israeli civilian airliner in Cyprus, the operation unravelled under scrutiny. The threat was unfounded, and the man no longer held the position for which he was killed.

The real story behind the assassination was not the preemption of a plot, but Israel’s targeting of a legacy. It may have revealed more about what it doesn’t know than what it does. Bdeir’s past association with Hezbollah’s now-defunct Unit 910, the foreign operations wing that was disbanded after a disastrous infiltration in 2014, belonged to another chapter. He was accused of leading Unit 3900 and planning an attack in coordination with Hamas, but the allegations collapsed under scrutiny. Bdeir had not been active in Unit 3900 for years; almost 10 years ago, his last connection was with Unit 910, responsible for overseas operations and sabotage.

The fall of Unit 910 

Unit 910 was quietly dismantled in 2015, its silence marking the end of Hezbollah’s most secretive and far-reaching apparatus. The collapse was triggered not by combat but by betrayal – the exposure of several operatives and overseas….