Unnamed sources told the newspaper that Hezbollah has received missiles and bombs on ships that go on to dock in ports in Belgium, Spain and Italy.

Hezbollah and Israel engage in daily exchanges of cross-border fire bringing the two countries close to all-out war and causing border regions to be evacuated.

The sources told the newspaper that Iran has switched to shipping weapons by sea after Israel’s air force began to target consignments coming in by land into northern Syria via Iraq.

Weapons and other goods are now shipped to the Syrian port of Latakia before the vessels go on to ports in Antwerp, Valencia and Ravenna, the Telegraph reported, in an attempt to disguise the purpose of the journeys.

From Latakia, the weapons are transported south to Lebanon.

A senior intelligence source in Israel said that “using Europe helps to hide the nature and the source of the shipments, switching paperwork and containers... to clean the shipments”.

“Europe has huge ports so Iran is using that as a camouflage. It’s very easy to do manipulations in those big ports where things have to get moved quickly, rather than a small port where there will be more scrutiny.

“It’s like a cat and mouse between us and the Iranians. They’re trying to smuggle and we’re trying to stop it. It’s been at least three years like this”, he added.

Photo: Reuters