Disclosures by Hizballah Indicate Evolving Employment of an Increasingly Diverse Arsenal of Propeller-Driven Strike Drones

Disclosures by Hizballah Indicate Evolving Employment of an Increasingly Diverse Arsenal of Propeller-Driven Strike Drones

***The following text is an excerpt from a longer SPAS Consulting report examining the evolution of Hizballah’s Strike Capabilities***

Hizballah’s Expanding and Evolving Use of the Mirsad Propeller-Driven Strike Drone

While Hizballah likely has access to the entire array of propeller-driven strike drones developed by Iran and employed by the Iranian military and/or Iran’s various non-state allies across the Middle East, the Lebanese armed group’s strike drone capabilities are so far largely associated with a single system, the Mirsad. The Mirsad, Hizballah’s designation for a twin-tailed version of the baseline Iranian Ababil, the Ababil-T, was first used by Hizballah in the early 2000s. The Mirsad is, as such, far from a new capability for Hizballah and is best characterized as a manifestation of 1990s Iranian uncrewed aircraft technology.

Iran’s non-state allies, above all Ansarallah in Yemen, regularly employ newer and more sophisticated propeller-driven strike drones than the Mirsad. Hizballah’s heavy usage of the somewhat aged Mirsad against Israel since October 2023 – and its unobserved employment of most of Iran’s newer and more capable propeller-driven strike munition designs – is therefore curious. Although Israel’s sustained interdiction efforts have likely limited the growth of Hizballah’s stockpile of newer and more capable Iranian propeller-driven strike drone designs such that the older Mirsad constitutes a larger portion of Hizballah’s arsenal than may otherwise be the case, Iran’s ability to transfer large quantities of similarly sized and even larger and heavier forms of military equipment to Hizballah suggests that Israeli interdiction efforts are unlikely to have been far more effective in stemming the transfer of propeller-driven strike drones relative to other types of armaments over a multi-year timeframe. It is therefore possible that Hizballah’s regular employment of the Mirsad propeller-driven strike munition is more reflective of the Lebanese armed group’s choices rather than its constraints. It is, for example, possible that the regular employment of the Mirsad reflects a deliberate prioritization of older strike drones in Hizballah’s arsenal, some of which may have been manufactured around 20 years ago, with newer and more capable Iranian propeller-driven strike drones held in reserve for an all-out conflict with Israel.

Its relative age and unsophistication notwithstanding, Hizballah has employed dozens of Mirsad strike drones against Israel since October 2023. Although Israeli air defences and electronic warfare are reported to have neutralized most of the strike drones launched by Hizballah, the subset of strike drones that successfully detonated in the vicinity of their intended targets have had a notable effect on the trajectory of the ongoing phase of the Hizballah-Israel conflict. Without the Mirsad or a similar propeller-driven strike drone, Hizballah would be mainly restricted to means of indirect fire, primarily undertaken by unguided artillery rockets launched in large salvos, to attack targets in Israel beyond the immediate vicinity of the Israel-Lebanon border along which direct fire weapons of various types, including anti-tank guided missiles, can be readily used. Since the introduction of the Israeli Iron Dome air defence system in 2011, the effectiveness of attacks employing unguided artillery rockets has dramatically decreased in scenarios short of a protracted and all-out conflict in which the total number of unguided artillery rockets launched over weeks if not months can exceed the number of Tamir interceptor missiles available to Israel’s Iron Dome batteries.

While Hizballah is estimated to have an arsenal of over 100,000 artillery rockets of various types, the Lebanese armed group is likely to only be capable of ever launching a subset of these in an all-out conflict with Israel – Israel is likely to destroy many of the facilities in which so many artillery rockets are necessarily stored for use as reloads. Moreover, Hizballah must be mindful of escalation control. Unguided artillery rockets are inexpensive and available to Hizballah in large numbers but cannot be readily employed to accurately attack a specific target and do so in a discriminate manner that lowers the risk of casualties among civilians, a central consideration for escalation control on both sides of the Israel-Lebanon border in scenarios short of an all-out conflict.

Although Hizballah is reported to have a sizeable arsenal of guided artillery rockets that can be used to accurately attack a given aimpoint, these are likely available in much smaller numbers than unguided artillery rockets. Moreover, most of Hizballah’s guided artillery rockets are likely to be no less vulnerable to interception by Israel’s Iron Dome system short of an all-out conflict scenario in which mass launches of unguided artillery rockets can be expected to saturate Iron Dome batteries and deplete Israel’s stocks of Tamir interceptors and thereby create an opening for the more effective employment of guided artillery rockets. In this context, propeller-driven strike drones such as the Mirsad offer Hizballah the ability to substitute for the mass use of indirect fire weapons to accurately strike targets beyond the immediate surrounds of the Israel-Lebanon border and do so in a manner that is aligned with efforts toward escalation control in scenarios short of an all-out conflict with Israel.

While Hizballah has employed the Mirsad with increasing regularity since October 2023, Israel’s persistent efforts toward the jamming and spoofing of Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) signals over this timeframe gives rise to uncertainties as to how Hizballah is operating its propeller-driven strike drones including the Mirsad. In the absence of interference, freely accessible GNSS services, of which the American Global Positioning System (GPS) is the best-known and most widely used example, provide accurate and reliable positioning data. This allows an onboard autopilot system to correct for the drift inherent to the onboard inertial navigation system which accumulates over time. As a result, a propeller-driven strike drone like the Mirsad can in principle be employed with equal effectiveness to attack targets at a range of 10 kilometers or 100 kilometers. In the absence of accurate and reliable GNSS positioning data, however, low-cost strike drones not equipped with other more complex and expensive GNSS-independent navigation and guidance systems cannot accurately navigate toward or accurately impact preprogrammed aimpoints. As a result, the jamming and spoofing of GNSS signals has the potential to severely degrade the effectiveness of the Mirsad and other propeller-driven strike drones in Hizballah’s arsenal.

Hizballah and Israel have made very limited direct disclosures as to how the subset of Hizballah’s propeller-driven strike drones that somehow evade Israeli air defences and electronic warfare systems accurately navigate toward and impact their preprogrammed aimpoints do so in an operating environment in which accurate and reliable GNSS positioning data is not available. Video footage released by Hizballah over the past ten months, however, indicates that Hizballah has adapted to the challenging electronic warfare environment by employing the Mirsad in several unusual and unexpected ways. Four observations stand out.

First, as of this writing, all footage of Mirsad launches released by Hizballah features the employment of this propeller-driven strike munition in daylight. This is curious as any strike munition relying upon a combination of INS and GNSS for navigation and guidance is, all things equal, equally effective independent of the time of day. Furthermore, slow and low-flying propeller-driven strike drones tend to be more effective when used at night as low light conditions facilitate the avoidance of optical detection and targeting by optically guided small arms and crew-served weapons.

Second, as of this writing, all footage of Mirsad launches released by Hizballah to date features the use of a rudimentary stationary launch rail placed on the ground on which a Mirsad is mounted. Launch rails are required as the Mirsad, which weighs the better part of 100 kilograms, is far too heavy to be launched by any human and the power output of its small engine is inadequate for a short takeoff. By placing a Mirsad on a launch rail, a small jettisonable solid booster rocket can be employed to take the aircraft to its operating altitude after which the piston engine, which is powered on while the Mirsad is taking off, propels the aircraft in flight. Hizballah’s observed practice of launching Mirsad strike drones off of stationary launch rails is rather curious as this strike drone can be readily launched from a vehicle carrying a launch rail with fewer personnel, at greater ease, and, not least, in a shorter timeframe. The use of a wheeled launch vehicle can also improve the survivability of the launch crew as such a vehicle can be concealed in a garage or similar structure prior to use, transit to a launch area (with the strike drone concealed by a tarpaulin or similar), and then transit to a sheltered location to reload. If accurate and reliable GNSS positioning data is available, then Hizballah should be able to launch a Mirsad from essentially any location in Lebanon without any variance in the accuracy and effectiveness of the strike drone.

Third, as of this writing, all footage of Mirsad launches released by Hizballah feature Mirsad strike drones being launched in densely vegetated areas with some footage indicating that the Mirsad was covered in camouflage netting prior to launch. Not only does carrying and/or assembling Mirsad strike drones in such locations take considerable time and require considerable physical exertion that could be avoided if a Mirsad is simply launched from a vehicle, but it also suggests the Mirsadstrike drones are launched from locations relatively close to the Israel-Lebanon border. If Mirsad strike drones are launched from locations further away from the Israel-Lebanon border, which is equally feasible provided that reliable and accurate GNSS positioning data is available, then launch crews would not be at such a high risk of being detected and attacked while setting up launch positions that concealment among dense vegetation and using camouflage netting would even be required. Instead, Hizballah launch crews seemingly undertake Mirsad launches in much the same manner as their colleagues operating mortars, short-range artillery rocket launchers, and anti-tank guided missiles along the Israel-Lebanon border who are constantly exposed to Israeli sensors.

Fourth, reports from Israel and Hizballah’s media disclosures indicate that Mirsad strike drones are typically employed against targets no more than 5-10 kilometers from the Israel-Lebanon border. This, of course, aligns with Hizballah’s deliberate efforts toward escalation control since October 2023, which has resulted in most of its attacks against Israel being limited to areas no more than 5 kilometers from the Israel-Lebanon border, an area in which most of the civilian population has evacuated. Efforts toward escalation control notwithstanding, this is a curious practice given that the Mirsad has a reported maximum range of over 100 kilometers. This is even more curious considering that, as previously explained, available information suggests that Mirsad strike drones are regularly launched from locations relatively close to the Israel-Lebanon border. As a result, Hizballah appears to be employing a 100+ kilometer range strike drone as if it were no more than a 10 to 20-kilometer range strike drone.

Why is Hizballah operating its Mirsad strike in such an unusual and unexpected manner? Hizballah is not the only operator of the Mirsad, and it is analytically productive to briefly contrast the Lebanese armed group’s employment of this Iranian propeller-driven strike drone design with its employment by Ansarallah in Yemen. Ansarallah operates versions of the same Iranian Ababil-T design under the designation Qasef as an autonomous strike drone following preprogrammed waypoints on the basis of GNSS positioning data. Ansarallah also operates the Qasef in versions that function as a loitering munition under real-time human control over a radio datalink (with the remote human operator receiving feedback through an onboard electro-optical sensor). During the active phase of the Yemeni Civil War, Ansarallah regularly employed the Qasef to attack stationary targets located dozens of kilometers behind the front lines. Ansarallah has also regularly employed the sensor-equipped loitering munition version of the Qasef to attack both terrestrial and maritime targets dozens of kilometers from the launch point. When compared to Ansarallah personnel operating the Qasef, the Hizballah personnel operating the Mirsad appear to be amateurs, a fact that is even more surprising when considering that the Mirsad has been in Hizballah’s arsenal for over twenty years. Ansarallah does not, however, operate its versions of the Iranian Ababil-T in an environment in which accurate and reliable GNSS positioning data is not readily available as a result of sustained GNSS jamming and spoofing efforts undertaken by an adversary with the electronic warfare capabilities of Israel.

The simplest explanation that can account for the observations made from the footage of Mirsad employment released by Hizballah over the past 10 months is that Israeli GNSS spoofing and jamming efforts have denied Hizballah’s propeller-driven strike drones access to accurate and reliable GNSS positioning data. As a result, Hizballah appears to be launching (unmodified) Mirsad strike drones from preselected and likely pre-surveyed locations close to – perhaps no more than 5-10 kilometers from – the Israel-Lebanon border to attack locations typically no more than 5-10 kilometers from said border. As a result, Mirsad strike drones may be covering a distance of no more than 10-20 kilometers. This likely reduces the flight time to no more than 20 minutes and thereby lowers the importance of accessing accurate and reliable GNSS positioning data to correct for the drift experienced by the onboard INS system. As a result, the Mirsad can be used in what is essentially a degraded manner in a degraded electromagnetic environment in which accurate and reliable GNSS positioning data is not available.

There are, of course, other plausible explanations, none of which are mutually exclusive, as to why Hizballah appears to be employing its Mirsad strike drones in the unusual and unexpected observed manner. For example, shorter flight distances and, as such, shorter flight times, reduce, in principle, the probability of interception by Israeli fighter aircraft and attack helicopters. This explanation would, however, be more persuasive if Hizballah employed launch positions close to the Israel-Lebanon border to attack targets deeper inside Israel with Mirsad strike drones. It is not, however, a persuasive explanation for the employment of Mirsad strike drones to attack targets close to the Israel-Lebanon border. After all, Israel is not operating attack helicopters and fighter aircraft at low and even medium altitudes within Lebanese airspace on a sustained basis given the threat posed by Hizballah’s air defence capabilities, which are no longer limited to light anti-aircraft artillery and shoulder-fired surface-to-air missiles as had been the case during the 2006 Hizballah-Israel conflict.

Another possible explanation is that concerns about escalation control have led Hizballah to employ its strike drone arsenal to attack more proximate targets – generally no more than 5 kilometers from the Israel-Lebanon border. This does not, however, explain why Hizballah would use strike drones with a maximum range of 100+ kilometers for such attacks. After all, Hizballah has a wide range of systems suitable for attacking targets no more than 5 kilometers from the border. This includes a diverse array of anti-tank missiles that can be used as direct fire weapons provided that there is a line-of-sight on the target. Where there is no line-of-sight on the target, Hizballah can employ the likes of the Burkan short-range heavy rocket and the Iranian Almas fiber-optic guided anti-tank missile, which, like the Israeli Spike missile from which it is derived, can be used in an indirect attack role against both stationary and moving targets (unlike most other anti-tank missile designs).

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Upgraded GNSS Antenna Arrays

While publicly available information suggests that Hizballah is adapting to intense Israeli electronic warfare efforts by employing its Mirsad strike drones in unusual and unexpected ways, the Lebanese armed group may have also retrofitted a subset of its Mirsad strike drones with GNSS antenna arrays that are more resilient to Israel’s jamming and spoofing of GNSS signals. If this is the case, then suitably upgraded Mirsad specimens can be employed as autonomous 100+ kilometer range strike drones in the manner these were originally intended.

The first indication of such a development emerged on 15 May 2024 when Hizballah successfully attacked a radar-carrying Sky Dew aerostat based at an Israeli military facility located around 35 kilometers from the Israel-Lebanon border. Although it is possible that the seemingly anomalous success of this particular employment of the Mirsad against such a (relatively) distant target can be explained by other factors, not least the failure of Israel’s air defences to intercept the Mirsad in question, the propeller-driven strike drone employed in this attack would nevertheless require accurate and reliable positioning data to navigate to a target located around 35 kilometers from the Israel-Lebanon border (i.e., to cover a distance of 40 or more kilometers if assuming a direct flight path to its intended target from a launch point no more than 5 kilometers from the border). While an anomalous deficit in Israeli electronic warfare and Israeli air defence coverage on 15 May 2024 may explain the successful attack on the Sky Dew aerostat, it would not necessarily explain why, on that date, Hizballah turned to a baseline Mirsad to attack a target around 35 kilometers from the border when baseline Mirsad strike drones were regularly used to attack targets no further than 5-10 kilometers from the border. Efforts toward escalation control can, of course, help to explain Hizballah’s decisions as to which targets should be attacked. Even so, the feasibility of attacking a given target is logically prior, and the Lebanese armed group’s observable practices concerning the employment of Mirsad strike drones are strongly suggestive of its inability to employ the baseline Mirsad strike drone in the role for which was intended as a result of the non-availability of reliable and accurate GNSS positioning data.

Video footage of Mirsad launches released by Hizballah in July 2024 may provide evidence in support of the hypothesis that a subset of Hizballah’s Mirsad strike drones have been retrofitted with more resilient GNSS antenna arrays which facilitate the use of the Mirsad against more distant targets despite continued Israeli efforts toward GNSS jamming and spoofing. Two of the Mirsad specimens depicted in footage released in July 2024 are equipped with a GNSS antenna array on top of the fuselage that is wholly different from those found on all other documented footage of Mirsad strike drones released to date. Notably, one of these two modified Mirsad specimens appears to be associated with an attack carried out on 20 July 2024 by Hizballah against a target in the Israel-occupied Golan located over 10 km from the Lebanese border. While not as distant as the May 2024 attack on the Sky Dew aerostat, the Mirsad employed on 20 July 2024 likely required access to accurate and reliable GNSS positioning data to travel 15-20 kilometers – possibly more – and it is possible that the new GNSS antenna arrays seen on at least two Mirsad specimens to date are more resilient to Israeli GNSS efforts toward GNSS jamming and spoofing.

Recent Disclosures Indicate Smaller-Scale Employment of Newer Iranian Designs

While the Mirsad remains the primary propeller-driven strike munition actively employed by Hizballah in its ongoing operations against Israel, recently released footage indicates that newer and more capable Iranian propeller-driven strike drone designs are also being employed albeit on a seemingly more limited scale. This includes a design identified in a July 2024 al-Akhbar (Lebanon) news segment under the name Nawras. Nawras appears to be Hizballah’s designation for a family of Iranian propeller-driven drones best known under the name Samad, which is the designation given to this design by Ansarallah in Yemen. Sparingly displayed in Iran in recent years under the designation Sayad, this family of Iranian propeller-driven drones is notable for being primarily operated by Iran’s non-state allies in Yemen and Iraq (where it is sometimes referred to as the KAS-04) – and now also in Lebanon – rather than by Iran itself. Although Hizballah has previously displayed a specimen of the Nawras at its museum in Mleeta, Lebanon, recently released footage offers confirmation that the Nawras is part of Hizballah’s arsenal. Recently released footage nevertheless raises questions as to how Hizballah operates this newer Iranian propeller-driven strike drone design.

The July 2024 al-Akhbar (Lebanon) segment curiously characterized Hizballah’s Nawras as an uncrewed intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) aircraft while showing specimens of the Nawras in two configurations – with and without an electro-optical sensor ball mounted under the nose – that are both notably equipped with a radio antenna on top of the fuselage. The use of an electro-optical sensor ball on the Nawras is noteworthy as this, alongside the radio antenna, allows a remote human operator to pan, tilt, and zoom the onboard electro-optical sensor to observe an area or object of interest while the aircraft moves in flight. While the use of an electro-optical sensor ball on the Nawras aligns with its purported role as an ISR drone in Hizballah’s service – at least in the sensor-ball equipped configuration – the Iranian Sayad design is typically employed as an autonomous propeller-driven strike drone by Iran’s various non-state allies. The primary exception to this is Ansarallah in Yemen, which operates the Sayad under the designation Samad. Ansarallah does not, however, employ the Samad as an ISR drone but as a loitering munition equipped with a nose-mounted forward-facing (i.e., restricted field of view) electro-optical sensor to attack both terrestrial and maritime targets. Hizballah, it seems, might be the only Iranian non-state ally to operate a Sayad in this previously unseen ISR-oriented configuration.

While the July 2024 al-Akhbar segment characterized the Nawras as an ISR drone, the specimens displayed without an electro-optical sensor are likely employed as autonomous propeller-driven strike drones in much the same manner as the Mirsad. If Hizballah operates the Samad within Lebanon, then it likely possesses a propeller-driven strike drone capable of targeting any location within Israel even when launched from northern Lebanon. This is, of course, predicated upon the availability of accurate and reliable GNSS positioning data, and Hizballah will likely have to retrofit Nawras specimens in its arsenal with GNSS antenna arrays that are more resilient in the face of persistent Israeli GNSS jamming and spoofing activity. That said, it bears emphasis that there is no indication as of this writing that Hizballah has employed the Nawras as either an ISR drone or as a strike drone against Israel since October 2023.

While Hizballah may not, as of this writing, have employed Nawras against Israel, the same cannot be said about other newer strike drone designs that the Lebanese armed group has also received from Iran. Over the past two decades, Iran has developed a highly diverse lineup of drones of increasing sophistication in comparison to which the Ababil-T, which Hizballah operates under the designation of Mirsad, is essentially a relic. Some of these designs, including the Sayad, which Hizballah designates as the Nawras, appear to be primarily intended for use by Iran’s non-state allies rather than by Iran itself. In such cases, Iranian-designed and built strike drones may be used by one of Iran’s non-state allies without the designation for said strike drone design being public knowledge.

In recent months, Hizballah has repeatedly employed a propeller-driven strike drone, designation unknown, that may be related to a widely used Iranian design, the Shahed-101, but is equipped with distinctive V-shaped vertical stabilizers and which possibly uses an electric propulsion system (the Mirsad and Nawras, in contrast, employ a small piston engine). While the use of electric propulsion likely results in reduced range relative to a version of the same airframe equipped with an internal combustion engine, it also lowers the acoustic signature of this undesignated strike drone. As a result, electric propulsion can improve the survivability of a strike drone flying at low altitude in enemy airspace and is therefore particularly desirable in drones configured for ISR roles and for strike drones that function as loitering munitions. The undesignated strike drone recently employed by Hizballah does not appear to be equipped with a discernible electro-optical sensor or antenna mast and is therefore likely employed as an autonomous single-use propeller-driven strike drone. It is, however, possible that an ISR-configured and/or loitering munition version of this design, designation unknown, exists but has not yet been unveiled. In addition to being of a far newer and more sophisticated design seemingly subject to increasing use by Hizballah against Israel, recently released launch footage indicates that at least two specimens of the new strike drone, designation unknown, are equipped with what is likely a larger GNSS antenna array on top of the fuselage behind the wing. This may indicate that at least some of these new strike drones, designation unknown, may be equipped with GNSS antenna arrays that are more resilient to Israeli efforts toward GNSS jamming and spoofing.

While the appearance of the Nawras and an as-yet undesignated design possibly related to the Shahed-101 is indicative of the transfers of more advanced strike drone designs by Iran to Hizballah, it is curious that only a small subset of Iran’s fast-expanding portfolio of drones has so far appeared in the Lebanese armed group’s arsenal. Although many of Iran’s uncrewed aircraft designs have range and endurance that is excessive for Hizballah’s purposes, and some are quite large and heavy and therefore require the use of a runway and are thereby unsuitable for Hizballah’s purposes within Lebanon, others are, in principle, well suited for the type of combat operations that Hizballah has undertaken against Israel over the past ten months. This includes the Fateh, a loitering munition modeled on the Polish Warmate, and the Sina and Meraj-521, which are both modeled on the American Switchblade loitering munition family. Hizballah also does not appear to operate a larger Iranian loitering munition design, designation unknown, that was unveiled in September 2023, and which appears to be an Iranian analogue to the longer-range Russian Lancet loitering munition.

As loitering munitions that function through real-time human monitoring if not remote piloting, it is possible that the aforementioned Iranian drones not known to be in Hizballah’s service are not thought to be practical in the face of Israeli signals intelligence capabilities, which can detect the location of the remote human operator, and Israel’s electronic warfare capabilities, which can not only jam and spoof GNSS signals but also jam the uplink and downlink transmissions without which loitering munitions cannot be employed (absent onboard computation capable of autonomously undertaking the targeting process). There are, of course, a wide range of potential explanations for the conspicuous absence of many of Iran’s most sophisticated propeller-driven strike drone designs from the ongoing phase of the Hizballah-Israel conflict including the possibility that Hizballah is holding these in reserve. It is also possible that at least some of these Iranian designs remain in development and are not ready for frontline use and/or that Hizballah’s training pipeline has been disrupted by ten months of high readiness and daily combat operations.

Disclosures of ISR Drone Flights Behind the Frontlines

Although this analysis focuses on Hizballah’s propeller-driven strike drone arsenal, it is instructive to also consider the Lebanese armed group’s employment of uncrewed ISR aircraft as this offers a window into how Hizballah has adapted to an operating environment characterized by sustained GNSS jamming and spoofing efforts. Furthermore, ISR drones likely play an important if indirect role in shaping the effectiveness of Hizballah’s strike drones. Beyond the question of the availability of accurate and reliable GNSS positioning data, propeller-driven strike drones cannot be used to attack moving targets unless these are equipped with both an onboard sensor and a radio datalink that facilitates real-time human monitoring if not control. Hence, the baseline Mirsad, which lacks an electro-optical sensor or datalink, can only be used to attack stationary targets. To identify the dispositions of Israeli forces, including newly occupied air defence sites, artillery positions, and similar, Hizballah’s strike drone operators require regular intelligence updates to both select targets and determine the best routes for a strike drone to navigate thereto. Given Iran’s limited imaging satellite capabilities and the restrictions on satellite imagery of Israel imposed by most commercial satellite imagery providers, Hizballah’s ISR drones likely play a critical if mostly unpublicized role in facilitating the more effective employment of strike drones.

Whereas Hizballah regularly claims responsibility for strike drone attacks and typically releases footage of strike drones during the launch process and/or in flight, the Lebanese armed group has been tightlipped about its employment of ISR drones over the past ten months of active combat operations against Israel. In June and July 2024, however, Hizballah released several videos, which are best described as compilations of multiple ISR flights, which publicized its use of ISR drones in areas far removed from the Israel-Lebanon border and the frontlines along which Hizballah’s forces have been actively engaged since October 2023. The first video released by Hizballah captured a series of flights by ISR drones flying over the Israeli city of Haifa and the city’s port areas, which include a naval base located some 35 kilometers from the Israel-Lebanon border. Hizballah has also released a video that captured the flight of an ISR drone over Ramat David airbase, which is some 50 kilometers from the Israel-Lebanon border. Notably, Hizballah has given no indication as to which ISR drone, or ISR drones, were used to undertake these ISR flights. There are, however, reports from Israel suggesting that at least some of these ISR flights involve the use of a small electrically powered drone supposedly designated as the Hudhod.

These videos raise numerous questions as to how Hizballah is operating its ISR drones and, no less importantly, why Hizballah appears incapable of operating its strike drones in a comparable manner – in the vicinity of the naval base at Haifa and Ramat David airbase several dozen kilometers away from the Israel-Lebanon border. Whereas Hizballah’s strike drone capabilities have likely been degraded by Israeli efforts toward the jamming and spoofing of GNSS signals, ISR drones operations face additional challenges in that Israel’s signals intelligence capabilities can detect the location of a remote human operator and Israel’s electronic warfare capabilities can be used to jam the uplink and downlink transmissions without which ISR drones cannot be monitored or controlled in real time. Several important observations can be made from Hizballah’s highly irregular and highly selective disclosures of ISR flights undertaken by uncrewed aircraft in areas far from the Israel-Lebanon border.

First, almost all the footage captured by ISR drones that Hizballah has released to date was captured in daylight with a visible band electro-optical sensor. Notably, the small amount of nighttime footage released to date was also captured with a visible band electro-optical sensor. This suggests that ISR drones equipped with infrared sensors are not available to Hizballah, have not been used since October 2023 (for reasons unknown), or have been used with the captured footage not being publicized (for reasons unknown). In any event, the non-availability of footage captured by an infrared sensor suggests that Hizballah’s ISR drones, or at least the drones that captured the subset of footage that has been publicly released, are likely equipped with commercially available electro-optical sensors. This, in turn, suggests that these are likely to be relatively low-cost ISR drones that the Hizballah can routinely hazard losing when undertaking high-risk ISR missions several dozen kilometers behind the Israel-Lebanon border.

Second, the visible band electro-optical sensors – digital cameras – used by the Hizballah’s ISR drones from which footage has been released are downward facing and never pan, tilt, or zoom. Stated differently, the electro-optical sensor never moves independent of the uncrewed aircraft that carries it in the footage that Hizballah has so far released. This is indicative of ISR drones equipped with a fixed electro-optical sensor operating on a preprogrammed flight path without a human in a loop, which would require active transmission over a two-way radio datalink. Otherwise, one would expect a remote human operator, even one controlling only the electro-optical sensor and not the flight path of the aircraft (i.e., an uncrewed aircraft equipped with an autopilot), to focus the lens toward some area or object of interest. The absence of any variation in the orientation of the onboard electro-optical sensor is particularly striking in footage captured by an ISR drone flying over an Israeli military base – in daylight – that appears to capture a moment that a Hizballah strike drone detonates on impact with the ground. The electro-optical sensor on the Hizballah ISR drone does not pan, tilt, or zoom, to focus on the unmistakable explosion and the plume of smoke that followed it – the video footage released by Hizballah only refocuses on this event as a result of editing after the video was recorded.

Third, the video footage of uncrewed ISR flights over Israel released by Hizballah to date suggests that the drones used on these missions followed preprogrammed flight paths, some of which appear to have entailed repeatedly flying over the area of interest in a shifting circle or oval-shaped pattern so that the downward facing onboard camera, which does not pan, tilt, or zoom, had an opportunity to cover a larger area than would otherwise be possible in a single pass. This is particularly notable in several video segments in which what appears to be a small and light ISR drone struggles against the wind to bank and maintain the preprogrammed flight path. Following a preprogrammed flight path is suboptimal in many respects, not least when the ISR drone is equipped with a downward-facing electro-optical sensor that cannot pan, tilt, or zoom because loitering over a naval base or an air force base is likely to increase the probability that an ISR drone is detected and intercepted.

Collectively, the three prior observations suggest that the ISR drone design, or designs, employed by Hizballah in these ISR missions several dozen kilometers from the Israel-Lebanon border were operated through the use of an autopilot that follows a preprogrammed flight path. This is notable in itself as these ISR drones apparently followed preprogrammed flight paths several dozen kilometers inside Israeli airspace – and possibly also undertook a return journey to land in Lebanon – seemingly without a human in a loop to undertake the task of navigation. Hence, it appears likely that Hizballah’s ISR drones accessed accurate and reliable GNSS positioning data in the face of Israeli GNSS spoofing and jamming efforts and this lends credence to the hypothesis that a subset of Hizballah’s strike drones have been refitted with more resilient GNSS antenna arrays.

This leaves open the question of how the footage captured by the onboard electro-optical sensor, which is likely recorded on an SD card, was accessed by Hizballah. If the footage was recovered after a given ISR drone returned to land in Lebanon (which, of course, essentially doubles the flight distance and flight time from the launch position in Lebanon), then the compilations of ISR drone footage released by Hizballah intrinsically reflect survivorship bias. Stated differently, it is possible that Hizballah only has access to, and can only release, footage captured by ISR drones that (A) successfully penetrated Israel airspace; (B) successfully captured footage over the area or areas of interest without being intercepted (or getting lost due to the non-availability of accurate and reliable GNSS positioning data); and (C) successfully returned to land and be recovered in Lebanon without being intercepted (or getting lost due to the non-availability of accurate and reliable GNSS positioning data).

While the absence of any discernible reorientation of the electro-optical sensor on these ISR drones and the nature of the observed flight path suggests the absence of real-time human control over the ISR drone or its electro-optical sensor, this does not necessarily mean that there was no real-time one-way transmission of sensor data from these Hizballah ISR drones operating in Israeli airspace. In principle, these ISR drones operated by Hizballah deep inside Israeli airspace may have been equipped with a satellite communications antenna that transmitted sensor data back to Hizballah. Satellite communication antennas are, however, heavy and expensive, and are therefore unlikely to be used on what appear to be small and inexpensive electrically-powered ISR drones. More generally, it is difficult to explain why Hizballah would not use satellite communications to also remotely operate the ISR drone’s electro-optical sensor if not the drone itself. Satellite communications is not, however, the only means through which the footage captured by the autonomous ISR drone’s electro-optical sensor may have been transmitted back to Hizballah while the drone remained in Israeli airspace. It is possible that Hizballah equips its ISR drones with Israeli SIM cards and thereby uses the Israeli mobile phone network to transmit sensor data over the internet back to Hizballah. If so, then Hizballah may be able to access some if not all of the captured footage even if the ISR drone does not make it back to Lebanon to be recovered after landing.

***The above text is an excerpt from a longer SPAS Consulting report examining the evolution of Hizballah’s Strike Capabilities***