On Wednesday, Israel Defense Forces carried out a large wave of strikes against 40+ sites belonging to the terror group.
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant claimed that the military has killed half of Hezbollah’s commanders in southern Lebanon.
“The other half are hiding or abandoning southern Lebanon,” said Yoav Gallant.
He said there would be further action in the months to come: “The coming period will be decisive” as Israel is facing “a number of alternatives” to bring security to the north.
The Times of Israel reports:
“Half of the Hezbollah commanders in south Lebanon have been eliminated… and the other half hide and abandon south Lebanon to IDF operations,” Gallant said, after holding an assessment at the Northern Command headquarters in Safed with the chief of the command, Maj. Gen. Ori Gordin, and other top officers.
He said Israel’s main goal in the north was to return tens of thousands of Israelis displaced by Hezbollah’s daily attacks to their homes.
“We are dealing with a number of alternatives in order to establish this matter, and the coming period will be decisive in this regard,” Gallant said.
As the defense minister toured the Northern Command, the IDF said some 40 Hezbollah targets in the town of Ayta ash-Shab were hit within just several minutes by fighter jets and artillery shelling.
The strikes followed the terror group firing anti-tank missiles at northern Israel.
Lebanese journalist Ibrahim Rihan told the Al-Haddad channel, “The situation in southern Lebanon is embarrassing Hezbollah, given the depth of the IDF’s attacks”
“We see that in every attack, the Israeli army eliminates senior members of Hezbollah or operatives in the organization. And Hezbollah’s response is to shoot at Kiryat Shmona or outposts in the Golan at a limited depth of up to ten kilometers.”
IDF takes operational control of Rafah crossing MAY 7, 2024
Israeli military strikes more than 100 Hamas sites in the southern Gaza city • Senior Israeli officials: Hamas ceasefire claims a stunt.
The Israel Defense Forces took control of the Gaza side of the Rafah crossing with Egypt on Tuesday morning, as tanks from the 401st Armored Brigade of the 162nd Division rolled right up to the station.
The Israeli flag was raised at the Rafah crossing and video showed an armored vehicle arriving at one of the buildings there, next to a sign that says “Gaza” in English. The IDF shared pictures and video of the moments that the Rafah crossing was captured.
“Following intelligence that indicated that the Rafah Crossing in eastern Rafah was being used for terrorist purposes, IDF troops managed to establish operational control of the Gazan side of the crossing,” the IDF said on Tuesday morning.
The General Authority for Crossings and Borders in the Gaza Strip has announced a complete halt to passenger traffic and aid into the Gaza Strip.
Separately, the IDF’s Givati Brigade captured the Salah a-Din road in eastern Rafah in an overnight offensive.
The capture of the crossing comes after the IDF announced on Monday night that it was conducting targeted strikes against Hamas targets in eastern Rafah. More than 100 Hamas sites were hit in the city, where the majority of the terror group’s remaining forces are located.
An Israeli tank positioned on the Gaza side of the Rafah border crossing on May 7, 2024. Credit: IDF. (source: JNS)
During the overnight operation, the IDF said that some 20 gunmen were killed and that Israeli forces located three “significant” tunnel shafts.
Additionally, the military said that an explosives-laden car was destroyed after approaching an IDF tank.
Israeli forces were also scanning the area for rocket launch sites, including the site from which Sunday’s attack on Kibbutz Kerem Shalom was launched. Four Israeli soldiers were wounded in that attack, and at least three others seriously wounded.
No IDF injuries were reported during the overnight operation.
Israel’s War Cabinet on Monday night decided unanimously to “continue the operation in Rafah to exert military pressure on Hamas in order to promote the release of our hostages and the other goals of the war,” per the Prime Minister’s Office.
According to Israel’s Channel 12 News, which cited Arab media, IDF ground forces entered eastern Rafah overnight Monday accompanied by heavy airstrikes, including so-called “Belt of Fire” barrages, which entail setting off rings of explosions around terrorist infrastructure.
Earlier Monday, the IDF called on residents of eastern Rafah to evacuate to newly established humanitarian zones.
The IDF has marked out two evacuation zones: an expansion of the Al-Mawasi zone along the central-southern Gazan coastline, and Khan Yunis.
Monday’s message directs noncombatants to the expanded area in Al-Mawasi, which includes field hospitals, tents and increased amounts of food, water, medicine and other supplies.
The Cabinet decided on the evacuation on Sunday night, with Defense Minister Yoav Gallant informing U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin of the decision overnight.
Meanwhile, Hamas on Monday claimed it had accepted a ceasefire deal proposed by mediators, in what senior officials in Jerusalem described as “an exercise by Hamas meant to present Israel as the refuser.”
The proposal that Hamas claimed to have agreed to is unknown to Israel and the United States and did not come up in Netanyahu’s conversation with Biden, stressed a senior Israeli political official cited by Ynet.
Jerusalem is nevertheless dispatching a delegation to Cairo to continue negotiations, while the operation in Rafah continues.
National Unity Party Knesset member Ze’ev Elkin told Ynet that it was good that the Rafah operation was finally underway.
“I hope it will be broad and that we will eliminate the Hamas battalions there,” he said. “It was right to act there already months ago.”
Four IDF soldiers wounded in Hezbollah attack on Kibbutz Yiftah JNS May 13, 2024
They were transported to Ziv Medical Center in Safed.
Four Israeli soldiers were wounded, including one moderately, by Hezbollah anti-tank fire from Lebanon on Monday.
The other three troops were lightly injured after two missiles hit Kibbutz Yiftah, south of Kiryat Shmona in the Upper Galilee.
They were evacuated to Ziv Medical Center in Safed and their families were informed.
The Hezbollah terrorist group took responsibility for the “anti-tank fire at Yiftah at 10:35.” The scene where a rocket fired from Lebanon hit Kiryat Shmona, May 10, 2024. Photo by Ayal Margolin/Flash90. (source: JNS)
In addition, the IDF said that an unarmed aircraft that crossed from Lebanon crashed in near the border moshav of Zar’it in the Western Galilee, with no casualties reported. This incident was followed shortly after by incoming missile and rocket fire alarms activated in the Western Galilee communities of Moshav Netu’a, Moshav Elkosh, the Christian Arab village of Fassouta and Mattat.
Hezbollah also took responsibility for an “air attack using UAVs at 6:20 in Beit Hillel.” The two kamikaze drones exploded near the moshav without an alarm being triggered in the area. A fire broke out as a result of the attack that was extinguished. There were no casualties.
Sirens sounded in other communities in northern Israel throughout the morning as Israel observed Memorial Day.
Meanwhile, a French official on Sunday denied a Channel 12 report from last week that Hezbollah rejected in writing a French proposal for a ceasefire with Israel.
“The report is inaccurate and wrong. There are no negotiations. Hezbollah refuses to negotiate while the war in Gaza is going on,” the official told The Times of Israel.
According to the Channel 12 report, Hezbollah communicated its rejection of the French offer through the Lebanese Shi’ite Amal party. The proposal reportedly included the building of watchtowers along the border to be used by the Lebanese Army.
The Paris initiative reportedly complicated American efforts to restore calm on the Israeli-Lebanon border. The French official dismissed any talk of watchtowers.
“One wonders who spread the reports, and who has an interest in getting in the way of a solution,” the official pondered.
The Israeli military has pushed back Hezbollah to “significant distances” from the border with Lebanon, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said last week, amid an ongoing low-intensity conflict with the Iranian-backed terrorist group. Defense Yoav Gallant holds a situation assessment at the IDF’s 91st Division along the border with Lebanon, May 8, 2024. Photo by Ariel Hermoni/IMoD. (source: JNS)
Hezbollah has carried out near-daily attacks on northern Israel since joining the war against the Jewish state in support of Hamas following the Gaza-based terrorist group’s massacre of some 1,200 people in the northwestern Negev.
Israel has threatened a major military offensive in Southern Lebanon to push Hezbollah north of the Litani River—some 18 miles from the border—if a diplomatic solution is not found. Efforts to calm tensions, including those of the United States and France, have been unsuccessful.