IDF Chief of General Staff LTG Herzi Halevi has announced that the name of the operations in the northern arena is “Northern Arrows”, IDF Spokesperson Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari told reporters late Monday night.
It is, for all practical purposes, an official launch of the Third Lebanon War.
“Since October 8th the Hezbollah terrorist organization has fired over 9,000 rockets, missiles, and UAVs at Israeli families, homes, and communities in the last week alone,” Hagari said.
“In the last week alone, Hezbollah fired over 700 rockets, missiles, and UAVs, hitting homes deep inside Israel and forcing hundreds of thousands of Israelis into bomb shelters.
“For years, Hezbollah has been planning to do in northern Israel what Hamas did in southern Israel on October 7th: invade Israel, infiltrate civilian communities, and massacre innocent civilians.
“To achieve this goal, Hezbollah drew up a plan. They called it “Conquer the Galilee”, Hagari said.
Last Friday the IDF carried out an intelligence-guided surgical strike in Beirut to eliminate Ibrahim Aqil, the architect of Hezbollah’s “Conquer the Galilee” plan.
More than a dozen additional senior Radwan Force commanders were eliminated together with Aqil as they were meeting to plan an October 7th-style attack on northern Israel.
“To make sure that Hezbollah can’t carry out such an attack and in order to enable all 60,000 Israelis to safely return back to their homes in northern Israel we must act against this threat,” Hagari said.
“This threat is just a few hundred meters away from the communities and families in northern Israel.
Beginning Monday morning and continuing throughout the day, Israeli fighter pilots and other forces conducted extensive strikes against Hezbollah terror targets in Lebanon that posed an imminent threat, Hagari said.
By 10 pm Monday night, the IDF had attacked 1,300 Hezbollah targets.
Included among the targets were long-range cruise missiles, heavyweight rockets with 1,000 kg warheads; the same type of rocket Hezbollah fired at the Druze village of Majdal Shams, murdering 12 children while they were playing soccer.
“We also struck short and medium-range rockets, and UAVs, all capable of attacking deep inside Israeli territory and causing major damage to civilian towns and cities,” Hagari said.
“As part of our efforts to mitigate harm to civilians, we provided advanced warnings to civilians in specific villages in Lebanon where Hezbollah embedded its military assets and weapons, and warned them to move out of harm’s way,” he said. “However, even as we called on civilians to move away from danger, we saw that Hezbollah operatives were doing the opposite and acted to prevent civilians moving to safety. This is because Hezbollah uses the civilian population, and civilian homes, as a human shield for its terrorist activities.
“Today, we exposed this strategy, showing how Hezbollah uses civilian homes as a cover for their deadly weapons.”
“In these images, you can see how Hezbollah hides long-range rockets with a range of hundreds of kilometers, inside the attic of a house in the heart of the Houmin Al Tachta village in Southern Lebanon.
“You can see that the rocket is stored on a hydraulic system and is prepared for launch out of an opening in the roof, directed at the communities in northern Israel.
Under this attic, a family lives, and serves as a human shield for Hezbollah.
Following IDF strikes today, we saw many secondary explosions – such as this. Behind every secondary explosion, there’s a building containing deadly munitions, rockets, and missiles triggering such a reaction like you see here. It is likely that some of the casualties are from these secondary explosions.
Here, too, you can see a house used by Hezbollah to store its weapons. In the footage here, following our strike on the weapons, secondary explosions can be clearly seen, and a rocket fired and hit a nearby house.
“Let me be clear: Hezbollah is responsible for this situation,” Hagari said. “This is Hezbollah’s plan – to turn southern Lebanon into a battlefield for its attacks on Israel.
“We cannot accept a terrorist group storing weapons inside people’s homes, and using them to fire at other civilian communities.”
Hagari echoed the statements of Israeli government ministers, all of whom have called on the international community to condemn Hezbollah’s “grave violations of international law and actions that endanger civilians on both sides of the border.”
The IDF made phone calls, and sent text messages to tens of thousands of Lebanese residents early Monday, urging them to evacuate to safety. “The IDF makes vast efforts not to hit civilians and makes every effort to mitigate harm to civilians during operational activity,” Hagari emphasized.
“Regarding the high number of casualties, everyone is a tragedy. In Lebanon, among those killed were large numbers of Hezbollah terrorists who were next to the weapons that we targeted.
“Israel is facing threats on all fronts and continuing to act against them in defense of the people of Israel.
“We have many other missions to carry out,” Hagari added.
“We have to bring back home all of the hostages held in brutal conditions by Hamas. We have to continue dismantling Hamas’s capabilities in Gaza. And we have to bring security to every Israeli citizen, in the north and in the south.”
