Israel vows to eliminate Hezbollah drone unit after rare deadly successful strike

The Israeli Air Force vowed to take out Hezbollah’s drone unit after one of the terrorists’ devices killed four teenage Jewish soldiers and injured nearly 60 people outside of Haifa on Sunday, officials say.Hezbollah’s Unit 127, the battalion responsible for producing and operating the Lebanese terror group’s drones, has become the No.

1 priority for the IAF, since the enemy’s unmanned aerial vehicles have proven harder to deflect than its constant missile barrages, sources told the Times of Israel.IAF officials said they would be ramping up Israel’s aerial defenses after an investigation found that the enemy drones near the Golani training camp were incorrectly believed to have been destroyed before they went on to do damage.The Israeli military said multiple drones had been fired by Hezbollah on Sunday, with three making it over the border before they were reportedly struck down by Israel’s Air Force, Navy and legendary Iron Dome defense system.

An investigation then revealed that an UAV that was chased by Israeli jets and helicopters was not actually destroyed after disappearing from sight and radar.The drone instead continued its flight as it pinged in and out of Israeli detection before hitting the training camp, the Times of Israel said.

The blast killed 19-year-olds Omri Tamari, Yosef Hieb, Yoav Agmon and Alon Amitay, with Hezbollah claiming responsibility for the attack as retaliation for an Israeli airstrike in Beirut last week that killed 22 people. Since Hezbollah began its daily attacks against Israel last year, the terror group has fired about 1,200 drones, with an estimated 221 managing to sneak through Israel’s defenses, according to the Israel Defense Force.Orna Mizrahi, a senior research fellow at the Israeli Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv, warned that Hezbollah is leaning in favor of drone attacks given they’re much cheaper and harder to detect than missiles.

“[They] are small in size, very light, with...