Middle East, 1900–present All events

Category: War, from Wikidata’s class “military operation”

Operation Mole Cricket 19

9 June 1982 · Lebanon

Part of: 1982 Lebanon War

Wikidata classes on our event-class list: military operation (all its classes: Wikidata item)

Read on Wikipedia

Operation Mole Cricket 19 (Hebrew: מבצע ערצב-19, romanized: Mivtza ʻArtzav Tsha-Esreh) was a suppression of enemy air defenses (SEAD) campaign launched by the Israeli Air Force (IAF) against Syrian targets on June 9, 1982, at the outset of the 1982 Lebanon War. The operation was the first time in history that a Western-equipped air force successfully destroyed a Soviet-built surface-to-air missile (SAM) network. It also became one of the biggest air battles since World War II, and the biggest since the Korean War. The result was a decisive Israeli victory.

The IAF began working on a SAM suppression operation at the end of the Yom Kippur War. Rising tensions between Israel and Syria over Lebanon escalated in the early 1980s and culminated in Syria deploying SAM batteries in the Beqaa Valley. On June 6, 1982, Israel invaded Lebanon, and on the third day of the war, with clashes ongoing between the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and the Syrian Army, Israel decided to launch the operation.

The battle lasted about two hours, and involved innovative tactics and technology. By the end of the day, the IAF had destroyed 29 of 30 SAM batteries deployed in the Beqaa Valley, and shot down 82–86 enemy aircraft, with minimal losses of its own. The battle led the United States to impose a ceasefire on Israel and Syria.

Text retrieved 2026-09-26 from Wikipedia.

Cite this

The link is the Wikipedia revision of August 22, 2026 (revision 1370693848), whose lead is exactly the text shown here.

APA 7

Operation Mole Cricket 19. (2026, August 22). In Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Operation_Mole_Cricket_19&oldid=1370693848

MLA 9

“Operation Mole Cricket 19.” Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 22 Aug. 2026, en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Operation_Mole_Cricket_19&oldid=1370693848.

Chicago (note)

Wikipedia, “Operation Mole Cricket 19,” last modified August 22, 2026, 15:47 (UTC), https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Operation_Mole_Cricket_19&oldid=1370693848.

Chicago (shortened note)

Wikipedia, “Operation Mole Cricket 19.”

Chicago cites well-known reference works such as Wikipedia in notes only, not in the bibliography.

This event on Middle East, 1900–present: https://middleeast.events/event/operation-mole-cricket-19

If you use the map’s borders: CShapes 2.0 - historical country borders. Schvitz, G., et al. (2022). CC BY-NC-SA 4.0. https://icr.ethz.ch/data/cshapes/ (modified by middleeast.events); West Bank Areas A/B/C: UN OCHA / HDX "Oslo Agreement" Areas A/B/C (West Bank). Distributed under the legacy HumanitarianResponse.info terms: non-commercial use with credit to UN OCHA. https://data.humdata.org/dataset/state-of-palestine-other-0-0-0-0-0; some corrected border points: GeoNames - CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). https://www.geonames.org/

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Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0 by Wikipedia contributors, from the article Operation Mole Cricket 19. Classes are Wikidata’s labels (CC0). “Part of” is Wikidata’s statement, in its labels (CC0).