Today there are more Islamist terrorists around the world than there were on September 11, 2001. John Hannah argues that this statistic alone speaks to the failure of American efforts to wage a war of ideas alongside that on the battlefield. To do so effectively, he argues, Washington must exert pressure on those countries that have sowed the ideas that have given rise to al-Qaeda and Islamic State—including Iran, Turkey, and Qatar, but also friendlier nations:

One important example concerns what President Trump discussed in Riyadh back in 2017: the need for America’s Muslim partners to take the lead in defeating the ideology of Islamist extremism. Or more importantly, the need for a handful of states, first and foremost Saudi Arabia, to get out of the business of exporting supremacist versions of the faith around the world. Yet you’d be hard-pressed to find Trump ever speaking publicly about the issue again. Instead, his demands on the Saudis rapidly shifted to shorter-term, more transactional issues like buying ever-greater quantities of U.S. weapons, keeping oil prices low, and supporting what in all likelihood will be a stillborn plan for Middle East peace. . . .

That’s particularly unfortunate, because the Saudi crown prince Mohammad bin Salman has himself claimed since late 2017 that Riyadh is now determined to destroy the extremist ideology that it did so much, for so long, to promote. To the crown prince’s credit, it hasn’t all been lip service. [For instance, the Saudi-based] Muslim World League’s . . . head, Mohammad al-Issa, a cleric and former justice minister, has made a series of remarkable statements in what appears to be a sincere one-man campaign to promote moderation—including condemning Holocaust denial, promising to visit Auschwitz, and telling Muslim minority communities to “embrace the nations they live in,” strictly obey national laws, and positively integrate into society. . . .

But Wahhabism’s trail of wreckage runs deep and wide. It will take much more than a few op-eds by a single Saudi cleric to make a dent in the damage that’s been done.

Last month, two potent reminders were on vivid display. In the run-up to Indonesia’s national elections, several reports detailed the troubling expansion of Saudi-backed Wahhabism in the world’s most populous Muslim-majority country. . . . And in the aftermath of the Easter attacks in Sri Lanka, article after article described the inroads that Wahhabism had made over decades, generating serious fractures within Sri Lanka’s Muslim community and establishing a fertile breeding ground for the kind of violent extremists who perpetrated the bombings.

On Tuesday, a Hizballah drone attack injured three people in northern Israel. The next day, another attack, targeting an IDF base, injured eighteen people, six of them seriously, in Arab al-Amshe, also in the north. This second attack involved the simultaneous use of drones carrying explosives and guided antitank missiles. In both cases, the defensive systems that performed so successfully last weekend failed to stop the drones and missiles. Ron Ben-Yishai has a straightforward explanation as to why: the Lebanon-backed terrorist group is getting better at evading Israel defenses. He explains the three basis systems used to pilot these unmanned aircraft, and their practical effects:

These systems allow drones to act similarly to fighter jets, using “dead zones”—areas not visible to radar or other optical detection—to approach targets. They fly low initially, then ascend just before crashing and detonating on the target. The terrain of southern Lebanon is particularly conducive to such attacks.

But this requires skills that the terror group has honed over months of fighting against Israel. The latest attacks involved a large drone capable of carrying over 50 kg (110 lbs.) of explosives. The terrorists have likely analyzed Israel’s alert and interception systems, recognizing that shooting down their drones requires early detection to allow sufficient time for launching interceptors.

The IDF tries to detect any incoming drones on its radar, as it had done prior to the war. Despite Hizballah’s learning curve, the IDF’s technological edge offers an advantage. However, the military must recognize that any measure it takes is quickly observed and analyzed, and even the most effective defenses can be incomplete. The terrain near the Lebanon-Israel border continues to pose a challenge, necessitating technological solutions and significant financial investment.