New Front Threatens Tel Aviv... Iraqi Militias Knock on Israel's Doors

The Israeli security establishment sees the Iraqi arena as becoming a source of annoyance for the Hebrew state, with 3 "suspicious" drones crossing the country within one week.

According to a report by the Hebrew website "Walla", this development places the defense establishment before a complex intelligence and operational challenge requiring high precision and extreme flexibility given the limited time available to respond.

Israel witnessed a series of unusual incidents that began last week, when the army intercepted a drone flying over Syrian airspace and approaching Israeli airspace. Days later, before the mystery of the first incident was solved, another drone was spotted in Jordanian airspace near the Dead Sea area, and it too was heading towards Israel.

Despite Israel's success in all three interceptions, concern and tension continue to rise within the defense establishment, as the ongoing ambiguity indicates a clear intelligence gap.

According to what "Walla" quoted from a security source, suspicions are currently focused on these drones being launched from Iraqi territory, noting that "no final decision has been made yet, but it seems we are not ruling out the possibility that this is the beginning of a signal from hostile elements in Baghdad with Iranian support to Israel."

This assessment comes at a time when in-depth investigations, intensive intelligence efforts, and collection of debris from the field have not conclusively determined the identity of the operator of any of the three drones.

Over the past few days, multiple assessments have been put forward regarding the entity behind these operations, with possibilities including the involvement of regional and international actors such as Iran, Hezbollah, or Russia, in addition to other hostile organizations, and even the possibility that one of the drones was American and out of control.

However, none of these hypotheses have yielded definitive results so far, while a senior military official said that "any threat that infiltrates Israeli airspace must be dealt with with the utmost seriousness."

He explained that the procedures include deploying the air force to intercept immediately, and putting air defense systems on full alert, while intelligence elements work in parallel to examine the source of the threat and whether the vehicle is friendly or hostile, belonging to Israel or a foreign entity.

The three interception operations do not remove the underlying concern, and according to the "Walla" report, the continued inability of intelligence to identify the operator after three consecutive incidents clearly indicates the existence of an entity exploiting a security gap to operate drones.

Officials fear that this exploitation could develop into a more extreme scenario in the future, making the Iraqi arena an increasing source of annoyance for the Israeli army at the present stage.