Israel has begun limited ground incursions into Lebanon for the first time, a dramatic escalation in the 11-month conflict with the Iranian-backed militia group Hezbollah and the start of a larger and potentially long fight against the group.
The Israeli military said in posts on social media early Tuesday local time that forces were beginning “limited, localized, and targeted ground raids based on precise intelligence against Hezbollah terrorist targets and infrastructure in southern Lebanon” in an operation called “Northern Arrows.”
“These targets are located in villages close to the border and pose an immediate threat to Israeli communities in northern Israel,” the statement reads.
The Israeli military raids are likely just the beginning, and it’s possible that the wider war the U.S. has sought to deter since October 2023 has now arrived.
The Biden administration has pushed for months to reach a diplomatic solution to the conflict between Hezbollah and Israel and has tried more aggressively in the past few weeks as fears of a ground invasion approached.
But Israel rejected a 21-day truce proposed last week by the U.S. and France, along with other allies, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu delivered a fiery speech at the United Nations General Assembly in New York last Friday vowing to continue the war against Hezbollah and Hamas in Gaza.
In the past two weeks, Israeli forces detonated pagers and walkie-talkies and carried out massive strikes on Lebanon, including an attack on Friday that killed Hezbollah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah.
Israel has already decimated most of Hezbollah’s command structure, but the militant group remains intact and capable of firing rockets over the border.
With the war in Gaza winding down and sucking up fewer resources in the past two months, Israeli officials set a war goal to return home the some 60,000 displaced residents from the northern border, and troops have been moved from the south and up north.
Israeli officials and military commanders were increasingly hinting that a ground invasion was imminent, especially after reported small, special-forces raids launched over the border earlier on Monday.
Israel and Hezbollah have been trading fire over the border since a day after Hamas invaded Israel on Oct. 7, killing some 1,200 people and taking around 250 hostages, and sparking the ongoing war in Gaza in which more than 41,000 Palestinians have been killed. Around 100 hostages remain in Gaza.
Hezbollah is Iran’s star proxy against Israel and the main bulwark it uses against the state. Still, it’s unclear how Tehran, which has tried to avoid escalating tensions amid the war in Gaza, will react to a ground invasion that could further endanger the militant group’s resources, capabilities and standing in Lebanon.
The U.S. has positioned an aircraft carrier strike group and amphibious assault ships in the Middle East region to deter Iran and any other actors from escalating the conflict. On Monday, the Pentagon announced more forces were being sent to the region.
Still, Israel faces a serious risk in the invasion. The last time Israel invaded Lebanon was in 2006, after Hezbollah took captive two Israeli soldiers.
The 34-day war ended with a United Nations-brokered cease-fire and failed to achieve a stated Israeli goal of destroying Hezbollah, which has only grown in strength since the conflict.
Israel also fought and occupied southern Lebanon from the 1980s to 2000, which gave rise to Hezbollah in the early ’80s.
The Israeli military said in its Tuesday statement that forces were now carrying out a “methodical plan set out by the General Staff and the Northern Command, which IDF [Israel Defense Forces] soldiers have trained and prepared for in recent months.”
“The IDF is continuing to operate to achieve the goals of the war and is doing everything necessary to defend the citizens of Israel and return the citizens of northern Israel to their homes,” the statement reads.