TEL AVIV – Israel is “closer to war” with Hezbollah and a possible regional war than ever before, a senior Israeli official said.
Israeli and Hezbollah troops have been engaged in a firefight on the Lebanese-Israeli border for over three months. According to The Times of Israel, about 15 Israelis were killed in the violence, including both civilians and members of the Israel Defense Forces. The terrorist organization Hezbollah claims 171 of its members have been killed since October 8, The Times of Israel reported.
On Thursday, Israeli forces reported that they had attacked Hezbollah's infrastructure in at least five locations in southern Lebanon. No deaths were initially reported. There have been back and forth attacks since then, including on a Friday when the IDF said it carried out attacks that allegedly killed four Hezbollah members, according to The Times of Israel.
Northern Israel is teeming with tens of thousands of regular troops and about 60,000 reservists, an IDF official told ABC News on Wednesday.
An Israeli government estimate says nearly 100,000 Israelis have evacuated the country's northern cities and tens of thousands of Lebanese living near the border have fled the fighting. According to the International Organization for Migration, an estimated 76,000 Lebanese living at the border have fled. The Lebanese government has also accused Israel of attempting to create a de facto buffer zone by destroying tens of thousands of trees to deprive Hezbollah of cover.
A civil defense worker carries parts of a destroyed car after an Israeli drone strike in the southern city of Bazouriyeh, Lebanon, January 20, 2024. Mohammad Zaatari/AP
The Israeli official also told ABC News that during a war cabinet meeting on October 11, most Israeli ministers, including Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, pushed for a preemptive strike against Lebanon, but that some held back, including professional staff and the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu advised them against it.
In a recent interview with ABC News, Gallant said Israel was “working against Iran in all areas. The Iranians are behind Hezbollah, Hamas and the Houthis. They support and finance proxies and carry out attacks… disrupting freedom of navigation.” Gallant's comments appeared to be a reference to a series of attacks by Israel targeting key Iranian and Hezbollah officials in Syria and Lebanon in recent weeks were killed.
“Israel has really stepped up the rhetoric and war signals lately,” said Maha Yahya, director of the Malcolm H. Kerr Carnegie Middle East Center, while Hezbollah, “which used to respond to Israeli attacks person by person, city by city….” . has tried to keep the conflict under control.” She said both Hezbollah and its backer Iran are aware that a conflict between Hezbollah and Israel could quickly lead to a regional war involving other states and entities would also involve Iran, the USA and the UK.
The Israeli official also said Israel used back channels to communicate with the leader of Lebanon's Shiite group, Hasan Nasrallah. The official said he sent messages to Nasrallah through back channels warning Nasrallah that he had miscalculated when he began attacks on northern Israel on October 8, a day after Hamas's rampage in Israel on October 7. October, in which around 1,200 Israelis died. The officials said he warned Nasrallah not to provoke Israel and threatened massive retaliation.
Israel's assessment, the official said, is that Hezbollah, like its Iranian backers, is desperate to avoid an all-out war with Israel. Hezbollah and the tens of thousands of rockets it fired at Israel served as an insurance policy against Israeli attacks on Iranian nuclear facilities, the official said.
Hezbollah said its immediate goal was to stop Israel's military activities in the Gaza Strip.
Israeli soldiers search a field after two drones that were allegedly flying from Lebanese territory to Israel crashed near the kibbutz in northern Israel on January 25, 2024 in Kfar Blum, Israel. Amir Levy/Getty Images
Israel, the official said, hopes that U.S. special envoy Amos Hochstein, who has been involved in shuttle diplomacy in the region, can broker a deal through the Lebanese government to pressure Hezbollah to secede from the Israeli-Lebanese alliance to withdraw border in return for a small Israeli territorial concessions along the border. But a ceasefire along the border with Lebanon, the official said, is primarily dependent on a ceasefire in Gaza.
“Nothing will be signed until there is a ceasefire in Gaza,” the official said. “Even if it is temporary, like a month-long break, it would be very difficult to reach a diplomatic solution” while Israel is still focused on a war against Hamas.
In Gaza, Israeli forces continue to operate with ferocity and last week laid siege to Gaza's second largest city, Khan Younis. Defense Secretary Gallant told ABC News earlier this week that Israel has no intention of easing pressure there because “only pressure can get Hamas to return the hostages,” he said. However, special operations are also part of Israel's efforts to recover at least some of its hostages, he said.
“The future of Israel in the next 100 years depends on our victory in Gaza,” Gallant said. But the definition of that victory has changed. While Israel had vowed at the start of the war to kill every Hamas member involved in the rampage, Gallant now said that complete demilitarization of Hamas and the Gaza Strip would be enough. This includes removing the Hamas terror group as a governing body and removing senior Hamas leaders by any means, including negotiated exile to a third country, he said.
Smoke rises over the southern Lebanese village of Shihine on the border with Israel during an Israeli airstrike on January 22, 2024, amid rising cross-border tensions as fighting continues between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas in Gaza. Kawnat Haju/AFP via Getty Images
Israeli defense and military officials estimate that airstrikes on Gaza represent about 10-15% of attacks early in the war, as Gallant says the intensity of the war has waned significantly in recent weeks. Israeli and some American officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, continue to question the accuracy of the Hamas-run Health Ministry's daily death toll in Gaza, even as documented incidents of Israeli fire on civilians increase.
According to the Gaza Health Ministry, more than 25,000 people have been killed in Gaza since October 7, when Hamas launched its surprise attacks on Israel, with more than 1,200 people killed in Israel, according to the Israeli Prime Minister's Office.
On Wednesday, the United Nations claimed Israel fired two grenades at a training facility in Khan Younis that the U.N. said served as a shelter for 800 Palestinians, and on Tuesday a team from British news channel ITV allegedly shot Israeli snipers shooting people there An unarmed man with a white flag who had recently told the camera crew that he was trying to cross the battle line to his family.
Israel denied firing the shells at the UN facility, claiming the ITV video showing the civilians was edited and there was no way to tell who fired the shots.