Fiber-optic drones, used widely in the war in Ukraine

TEL AVIV, Israel — Hezbollah has launched a new weapon against northern Israel in the latest round of fighting: small drones controlled with fiber optic cables the width of dental floss that avoid electronic detection.

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These drones – widely used during the war in Ukraine – are small, difficult to track and deadly. Drones killed an Israeli soldier in southern Lebanon on Thursday and injured at least a dozen others in northern Israel, two of them seriously. A soldier and a defense contractor were killed in Lebanon earlier this week.

Many drones are susceptible to electronic jamming from air defenses. Jamming can cause a drone to crash or return to its point of origin.

Fiber optic drones are not controlled via GPS signals or radio control. They have a thin cable coiled behind them that connects the operator console directly to the drone, making electronic jamming impossible.

Drones are not foolproof because wind – or other drones – can cause cables to get tangled.

But “if you know what you’re doing, it’s absolutely deadly,” said Robert Tollast, a drone expert and researcher at the Royal United Services Institute in London, explaining how the drone can fly low and sneak up on a target.

Experts say the military must either intercept the drones, which is difficult because of their small size and short flight path, or find a way to cut the nearly invisible cable.

Hezbollah – the Iranian-backed militant group in Lebanon – announced it was using fiber-optic drones on Israeli soldiers operating in southern Lebanon or border towns.

Here’s a closer look at these weapons.

A new weapon with a long drag

An Israeli military official told AP that fiber-optic drones posed a relatively new threat in the latest round of fighting with Hezbollah. Hezbollah appears to have turned to them because Israeli air defenses have successfully countered larger, more powerful rockets, missiles and other drones, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity in line with military directives.

Israel believes the drones are locally made and are easy to produce – requiring little more than a commercially available drone, a small amount of explosives and transparent wire readily available on the consumer market, he said.

He called drones the biggest threat to troops in Lebanon, but said the Israeli military was working on technological solutions. Meanwhile, Israel is taking measures on the ground to defend its troops, such as adding nets and cages to military vehicles.

Fiber-optic drones are the latest element in a cat-and-mouse race as Israeli high-tech defenses race to intercept new threats, especially those that are less sophisticated.

Ran Kochav, former head of the Israeli army’s air defense command, said Israel was failing in its attempts to defend against fiber-optic drones.

“They fly very low and very fast, and they are very small, it is very difficult to detect them, and even once detected they are very difficult to track,” he said.

Kochav said Israel had spent years strengthening its air defense systems to improve its protection against rockets and missiles. But drones are not considered a top priority.

He said Israel should have followed the progress of fiber-optic drones in the Ukraine war and assumed that, like Russia, other Iranian allies would eventually use them.

A technological race in the war in Ukraine

Throughout the war in Ukraine, Moscow and kyiv have been engaged in a race to develop new technologies.

Russia strikes Ukraine almost every night with long-range Shahed attack drones, originating from Iran. Although Moscow has made many improvements to drones, some can still be neutralized by electronic jamming.

Fiber optic drones have been developed to get around this problem, although they do not have the same range as a drone using a radio link or artificial intelligence to navigate.

In some cases, fiber-optic drones have been recorded with cables extending up to 50 kilometers, said Tollast, the expert in London.

Russia and Ukraine use many types of drones “on a phenomenal scale,” he said.

In Ukraine, some fields are covered with drone cables

Fiber-optic drones are so widely used that images show Ukrainian frontline towns covered in shiny threads resembling fishing lines, resembling huge spider webs glistening in the sun.

Israel has enough firepower to intercept drones, but the key lies in early detection, Kochav said.

He explained that Israel already has appropriate technology that tracks changes in light, identifies signals and communications and can recognize the noise of drone propellers.

But he added that these surveillance systems have not been widely deployed along the northern border.

Hezbollah released videos of new drone attacks

In recent weeks, Hezbollah has broadcast videos on social networks and on its Al-Manar television channel of attacks with these new drones, notably against Israeli troops in southern Lebanon.

These attacks attracted public attention. An attack killed an Israeli soldier and injured six others, some seriously, last weekend. Another attack on Tuesday killed an Israeli civilian contractor in southern Lebanon.

During the attack that cost the soldier his life, Hezbollah released a video taken by the drone until it exploded among troops gathered near a vehicle. Another drone was fired at the same location as a military helicopter landed to evacuate the wounded, but narrowly missed.

Ali Jezzini, a journalist specializing in security and military affairs who closely follows Hezbollah’s capabilities, estimates that some of the drones used by the group cost between $300 and $400 each. He added that they appear to be manufactured locally using 3D printing technology, in addition to readily available electronic components, typically used for civilian purposes but capable of dual-use applications.

Hezbollah announced it had started using fiber-optic guided drones for the first time in the series of battles that began on March 2, after using other types of drones for years.

Israel also has a fleet of drones that carry out surveillance and attack operations, although not necessarily with fiber optic cables, to target Hezbollah militants.

In a house in northern Israel, a drone left spools of cable in the garden

Zevik Glidai, a 78-year-old mathematics teacher and volunteer ambulance driver, discovered spools of translucent fiber optic cables surrounding a drone that crashed in his backyard in the northern Israeli town of Kiryat Shmona on April 13.

His house is 2 kilometers (1.5 miles) from the Lebanese border. He was sitting at home when he heard a high-pitched scream and a small crash. His neighbor shouted that the yard was on fire.

They both put out the fire with a garden hose but noticed something new: the destroyed drone was surrounded by loops and loops of white wire.

“We are very worried about these drones because there is no way to shoot them down, because we cannot detect them,” Glidai said.

He said there were no warning sirens before the drone crashed, and the responding bomb squad called it a miracle that nearly 2 kilograms (4.4 pounds) of explosives did not detonate.

“They told me, ‘You are very lucky,’” said Glidai, who noted that he experienced several iterations of Hezbollah weapons during his 48 years in Kiryat Shmona. “They picked up all the pieces they could and left me some fiber optics as souvenirs. »