Israel foils massive international terror attack against hundreds of Israeli tourists. This was likely Iran's "Operation True Promise 3." ~ Elder Of Ziyon

Wednesday, April 02, 2025

Israel foils massive international terror attack against hundreds of Israeli tourists. This was likely Iran's "Operation True Promise 3."

YNet reported yesterday:

Israeli authorities said Tuesday they thwarted a major terrorist attack being planned against Israeli targets abroad, in what they described as one of the most serious plots in recent years.

The IDF and Shin Bet security agency confirmed that the overnight airstrike in Beirut's Dahieh district, a Hezbollah stronghold, targeted and killed Hassan Ali Mahmoud Bdeir, a senior operative in Hezbollah’s Unit 3900 and the Iranian Quds Force.

According to Israeli intelligence, Bdeir played a central role in a joint terror network involving both Hezbollah and Hamas operatives—a rare instance of cooperation between the Shiite and Sunni terrorist groups. The network was reportedly planning an imminent large-scale attack abroad, which officials said could have killed hundreds of Israelis had it been carried out.

According to French news agency AFP, Bdeir served as deputy to Hezbollah’s chief coordinator for Palestinian affairs. Lebanese newspaper An-Nahar published a photograph of Bdeir aboard a plane with former Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani and Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the senior Iraqi militia leader who was killed alongside Soleimani in a U.S. airstrike in 2020.

Shin Bet and IDF officials said the operation prevented a potentially catastrophic attack and marked a significant blow to the collaboration between Hezbollah and Hamas beyond Israel’s borders. Israeli authorities noted that Hamas’ overseas network operates from countries including Turkey and is attempting to expand into parts of Europe.

Everything we know so far makes this sound like this would have been Iran's "Operation True Promise 3," their pledge to hit back at Israel in a massive way in retaliation for last October's Israeli air strikes in Iran.

Iran doesn't have the capability to strike Israel directly without sparking a major war, which they don't want. It would always rely on proxies and plausible deniability for its attacks to dissuade Israel from attacking it directly. Just the time it would take to investigate a terror attack on foreign soil would add doubt and pressure on Israel not to respond, and it also complicates the legality of a direct military response to Iran under international law.

All the articles say that the planned attack would have killed hundreds of Israelis, not Jews. That would be consistent with Iran's goal of targeting Israel and not appearing antisemitic. It seems likely that it would have been against a tourist spot popular with secular Israelis on the upcoming Passover holiday, not a kosher for Passover specific program. Iran would probably have also chosen a non-Western target to avoid upsetting (and killing) Westerners which would result in, at the least, major diplomatic and economic fallout, if not military. Greece or even Sharm el-Sheikh would have too many risks.

My guess is that the planned attack would have been in Asian spots popular with Israelis, some of which have Israeli-owned guest houses. This attack seems likely to have been planned for a place like , Bangkok’s Khao San, Koh Samui or India's Goa, some of which are so popular that they have Hebrew signs around the hotels. Vietnam has been becoming an increasingly popular destination as well.

It is not as if Iran and Hezbollah haven't done this sort of thing before. In 2012, Hezbollah bombed a tourist bus with dozens of Israelis in Burgas, Bulgaria, killing six.

Thank God for Israeli intelligence and the IDF protecting Jews worldwide.