Senior MI official: Hezbollah has more firepower than before war
By Gideon Alon, Ha'aretz Correspondent
Ha'aretz, 20/02/2007
Brigadier General Yossi Baidetz, head of the research division at
the Military Intelligence Corps, told the Knesset on Monday that the
Hezbollah militant group is replenishing rockets launched or
destroyed during their war with Israel last year, and today has more
firepower than before the war.
"Hezbollah is building up more firepower than it had before the war.
Some of this ordnance has arrived, and some is still en route from
Syria," a spokesman for the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense
Committee quoted Baidatz as saying in the briefing.
Defense Minister Amir Peretz, who also attended the meeting,
corrected Baidatz saying the report does not pertain to actual
military force but to the potential for acquiring military
capabilities.
"Power comes down to more than just counting rockets," the panel
spokesman quoted Peretz as saying at the session. "Let's remember
that Hezbollah's network of outposts has been demolished. It is not
even at a quarter of its pre-war status."
Some committee members expressed their beguilement at the
contradiction between the intelligence officer and the defense
minister.
Peretz also replied to questions from committee members on his work
relations with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. Peretz said he holds
reasonable relations with the premier and that there is nothing in
them to detract from decision making procedures and the operation of
the Defense Ministry.
Peretz said that in the past month he has been on the phone to
Olmert 20 times a day. "I wish I saw my family at this frequency,"
he said with a smile.
Last week Olmert spoke before the committee on the same subject, and
told its members that he holds adequate work relations with the
defense minister. "The prime minister and the defense minister
aren't required to have an intimate relationship. No Basic Law or
religious commandment says that we must have an intimate
relationship," Olmert told to committee.
