Several Israeli reports revealed last week new information about the assassination of former Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah, saying the Joe Biden administration was reportedly furious about the operation.
The US did not try to stop the strike, but said the Israeli operation made them “look like fools,” a report by Israel’s Channel 13 said.
It showed that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu hesitated for a long time before he gave the order to execute the operation. Nasrallah was killed shortly after the Israeli PM gave a speech at the United Nations General Assembly.
On Sunday night, former Israeli Ambassador to the US, Mike Herzog, told Channel 13 that he attempted to provide advance warning of the strike.
Herzog said that it was agreed that Israel would update the Americans before the strike on Nasrallah’s compound, at the level of [then-National Security Advisor] Jake Sullivan.
In the interview, the former ambassador said, “We tried setting up a phone call with Jake Sullivan and he didn’t get back to us. He was angry because he thought we had deceived them, and we let them make public the initiative for a ceasefire and make them look foolish, while we are planning to eliminate Nasrallah.”
The US official who was informed about the Israeli operation is then-Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, who had received a phone call from then-Defense Minister Yoav Gallant.
Asked how Austin responded during the call, when Gallant informed him that the strike was about to occur, former US Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro made a diplomatic statement, saying, “I’ll allow others to characterize that call.”
During his interview with Channel 13, Gallant said, “I updated Austin 15 minutes before the operation. I told him, ‘We’re about to eliminate Nasrallah’. He asked me, ‘When?’ I told him, ‘15 minutes’. He really did not like this. He told me, ‘This could lead to a regional war’. I told him, ‘With all due respect, this man murdered thousands of Israelis and hundreds of Americans. I suggest you carefully consider your response.”
Gallant continued, “So he (Austin) asks me, ‘Are you convinced he’s there?’ I told him, ‘There is a very high probability.’”
At the end of September 2024, Israel was informed about Nasrallah’s plans to attend a high-level meeting in Beirut’s southern suburbs.
The French newspaper Le Parisien, citing a Lebanese security source, revealed that an Iranian spy provided Israel with information regarding the arrival of Nasrallah in Beirut's southern suburbs.
The report noted that Nasrallah arrived in the exact vehicle as Abbas Nilforoushan, the Deputy Commander of Iran's Quds Force in Lebanon.
According to Le Parisien, the informant alerted Israel about Nasrallah’s planned arrival at the headquarters on Friday afternoon, just four hours before the strike.
But Israel’s Kan 11 channel said Israel received the information days before the strike.
Nasrallah, who had led Iran-backed Hezbollah for 32 years, was killed on September 27, 2024 when a series of Israeli airstrikes flattened several buildings in Beirut’s southern suburbs.
