DAVID PATRIKARAKOS: Israeli sources say there’s never been a better time to destroy those who want them dead

The only surprise was that the attack didn’t come sooner.

Israel has spent weeks pounding Iran’s proxies – Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza.

It has killed both Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh and Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah – and on Monday night, Israel finally put boots on the ground in southern Lebanon.

The humiliation for the mullahs of Tehran has been relentless.

So last night’s sudden barrage of missiles — 500 illuminated the skies over Israel, which caused panic but inflicted limited casualties — was hardly unexpected.

This day was always going to come. It’s deja vu in the Middle East.

Once more, Iran strikes Israel. Once more, the Israel Defence Forces are marching across a border – this time to neutralise Hezbollah which has struck Israeli civilians, towns and cities almost daily since the October 7 Hamas atrocities.

Islamist terrorists in the Middle East refuse to let the Jewish state live in peace; and the Israelis have had enough.

Both Hezbollah and Tehran are united by a single goal: to destroy a sovereign democracy.

It is an intolerable situation for any nation state.

My Israeli sources tell me they are ready for anything Iran throws at them.

They believe that there has never been a better time to destroy those who want them dead.

Britain and America have significant military assets in the region, which will likely support Benjamin Netanyahu’s forces.

Yes, the United States has a senile incumbent and a vice president focused on winning an election – including from Muslim voters in swing states.

But after its stunning successes over recent weeks, Israel has momentum.

With so many ingredients in this seething cauldron, the regional and possibly global war that no one wants but everyone fears is now all too real a prospect.

Hezbollah has turned southern Lebanon into a staging post for its attacks.

Its border villages have become military bases; its houses ammunition stores and civilians are now human shields.

Now that Iran has attacked, the IDF’s mission in Lebanon could not be more critical.

The military has described the invasion as one that will be ‘limited, localised and targeted’.

The goal is to disrupt Hezbollah’s infrastructure and eliminate its military positions there.

Simple and quick, right?

The problem here is that this is exactly what the IDF told me the Gaza operation would be like when I visited their HQ in October 2023.

Almost a year later, Israeli troops are still in the strip.

Hamas, though massively degraded, is there, too.

The IDF will not find southern Lebanon a hospitable place.

It’s a beautiful part of the world, formed by the Jabal Amel mountains – rich in olives, grapes and tobacco – and the Litani River, which originates in the Beqaa Valley and flows southward, creating a fertile coastal plain, before turning west towards the Mediterranean.

But southern Lebanon is also home to something else: hundreds of miles of tunnels and caves, a subterranean labyrinth of terror that Hezbollah (Arabic for Party Of God) uses to hide, to store its massive arsenal and to launch its demented attacks.

Israel knows this.

Military spokesman Daniel Hagari, an articulate and thoughtful man in my experience, says special forces have in fact operated inside Lebanon dozens of times over the past months, destroying tunnels wherever they find them.

I don’t doubt it.

The Israelis are excellent at this sort of thing.

But still, I can’t help but worry – not least after last night’s spectacular missile onslaught.

Lebanon is a tiny country that has always exercised an influence far beyond its size.

It’s worth remembering a dictum of international politics: ‘Beware of small states.’

Believe me, no country has felt this curse more than Israel – itself a very small state.

On June 6, 1982, Israeli forces invaded Lebanon, aiming to quickly neutralise the threat to their north.

Operation Peace For Galilee was launched after gunmen from the Palestinian Abu Nidal Organization attempted to assassinate Shlomo Argov, Israel’s ambassador to the United Kingdom.

It was time, Jerusalem decided, to take them out once and for all.

This is a battle not just for regional security, but for anyone who cares about democracy, the rule of law and the right to live in peace.

Eighteen years later the Israelis, exhausted and demoralised, finally withdrew, the threat to their north still present.

When the Israelis whacked Nasrallah last week, they did not only themselves, but the world, a favour.

The Hezbollah boss was not just a terrorist butcher – he was a highly capable one.

With help from Iran, of course, the group has achieved more military success against Israel in just over 30 years than almost all the Arab states had in around 80.

First, it kicked the Israelis out of the ‘security zone’ they held in southern Lebanon for 18 years.

Then, in 2006, it fought Israel to something approaching a draw in a head-to-head war.

It began when Nasrallah ordered his men to kidnap some Israeli soldiers, which they did, and which brought a ferocious Israeli response.

So vast was the destruction to Lebanon that Nasrallah said that had he known how the Israelis would react he would never have ordered the kidnapping.

But to many in the Arab world, Hezbollah had once again stood up to the ‘Zionist oppressor’.

They were heroes. Well, no longer.

‘Unprecedented’ is an overused word in political and journalistic discourse, but Israel’s ability to pack thousands of Hezbollah pagers with explosives that were then distributed to the group’s members across Lebanon was truly something I’ve never seen before – an operation that will be studied in military history for decades to come.

Then they swiped Nasrallah himself.

The Israelis have since taken out around 98 per cent of Hezbollah’s leadership.

But Hezbollah is not just a terror organisation, it is a highly organised paramilitary group (not to mention political party and social actor in Lebanon).

Within its second-rung leadership, there are men who are smart and exceptionally ruthless as they’ve spent years fighting on the ground.

Already you can see how its tactics are shifting.

After Mossad took out Hezbollah’s pagers (and then walkie-talkies) it shattered the group’s communications, not only internally but with its masters in Tehran and terrorist allies across the region.

But it also forced Hezbollah to get creative and, in true Islamist style, this has meant regression — to earlier, more analogue forms of contact.

The militants now pass messages verbally, the group’s vast networks allow them to spread widely rapidly and, of course, it’s much harder to hack or intercept them with satellites.

Meanwhile, the bulk of Hezbollah’s ground forces remain — brandishing large amounts of sophisticated weaponry (including guided missiles theoretically capable of hitting deep inside Israel).

Israel is embarking down a hard and brutal road.

By splitting its resources between two fronts — not including any direct action it might take on Tehran — it may well be weakened.

But what choice does it have?

What would we demand of Downing Street if thousands of rockets had rendered large parts of Britain uninhabitable?

What would be the point of our armed forces if not to remove that threat?

We must hope that Israel succeeds in its missions against both Iran and its proxies, quickly and with minimal loss of life.

This is a battle not just for regional security, but for anyone who cares about democracy, the rule of law and the right to live in peace.