In a statement, the IDF said: “Hezbollah’s strategy to hide weapons and operate from civilian neighbourhoods stems from its intentions to draw the IDF to target these civilian areas in times of escalation.
“If Hezbollah were to target Israeli civilians from these sites, the IDF would have no choice but to react, potentially placing Lebanese civilians in harm’s way, causing international outrage toward the IDF.”
Ghassan Hasbani, the former deputy prime minister and an MP for the Lebanese Forces party, said Hezbollah’s control of the airport has long been a concern for Lebanon and more so now if it increasingly becomes a potential military target in the conflict with Israel.
Militia-backed power game
He called for action to assess risks at the airport for fear of a repeat of the tragic port disaster of 2020. “It’s very difficult to know who can take action,” he said. “The last time the government tried to take action in 2008, there was a violent reaction by Hezbollah.
“The area all around the airport is controlled by Hezbollah so many people are concerned about passage through the airport of Beirut, which is why many Gulf countries have at times imposed bans on their citizens travelling there,” he said.
“Weapons being transported from Iran to Hezbollah across border entry points or even weapon components, endangers both the Lebanese population and the non Lebanese travelling through and living in the country.”
Taking action is all but impossible without international intervention to implement relevant UN resolutions, he said. “The entrenchment of Hezbollah is everywhere, not only in the airport but in the port, the judiciary, it’s across society.
“The public administration now is largely hijacked by Hezbollah and it’s very difficult to remove that without changing the militia-backed power game that exists today.”
A security source at the International Air Transport Association (IATA) told The Telegraph: “We have been aware of this for years, but we are unable to do anything without international legal action. We are hand tied to do what we’d really like, which is to close the airport and have all the weapons and explosives removed.”
For years, Israel has carried out attacks on Damascus and Aleppo airports in Syria where Iran transfers weapons from production facilities to its proxies in the region, including Hezbollah. Several of these have been on civilian flights.
In November, Damascus airport was forced to close after strikes saw all flights diverted.