Hezbollah and Israel escalate attacks, accusing each other of violating ceasefire

The IDF already controlled southern Lebanon and wanted to continue to destroy Hezbollah’s weapons stored in nearby villages as well as kill the terror group’s fighters if they remained in that area and refused to surrender.

In the broader scheme, Israel has also hoped to hold onto southern Lebanon for an extended period to help pressure Hezbollah into a process of disarming.

In contrast, Hezbollah wanted the IDF to cease operations in southern Lebanon on the way to a more speedy withdrawal from the area back to within Israel’s borders.

Since April 17, the IDF continued to kill Hezbollah fighters in southern Lebanon and occasionally even North of the Litani River, if there was a claim that a rocket cell was about to fire on the IDF or Israeli civilians.

Senior Israeli officials have told their American counterparts that if Hezbollah continues attacking IDF soldiers, Israel will be unable to maintain its current measured response, according to two sources familiar with the discussions.

Last week, President Donald Trump announced that the ceasefire would be extended for another three weeks following a meeting between Israel’s ambassador to the United States, Yechiel Leiter, and Lebanon’s ambassador to the United States, Nada Hamadeh Mouawad. Trump also said that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is expected to meet Lebanese President Joseph Aoun at the White House in the near future.

On Sunday evening, Netanyahu convened a small group of ministers along with senior security officials to discuss both Iran and the situation in Lebanon. One option under consideration is escalating strikes against Hezbollah, including targeting areas beyond southern Lebanon.

Earlier, at the start of the government meeting, Netanyahu acknowledged that the US administration is limiting the scope of Israel’s response.

“We are acting vigorously according to rules agreed upon with the United States—and, incidentally, with Lebanon as well. This means freedom of action not only to respond to attacks—that is clear—but also to thwart immediate threats and to address emerging threats,” Netanyahu said.

He added that Israel is not prepared to accept Hezbollah’s actions and that “we will do what is necessary to restore security to the north.”

However, until the end of last week, Hezbollah had held off from firing any rockets at civilians in Israel proper, and the IDF had held off from high-profile attacks in Hezbollah stronghold areas like Dahiyeh in Beirut or the Bekaa Valley.

When Hezbollah started to fire rockets and launch drones at northern Israel at the end of last week, it still did so in small volumes, but this led to pressure on the government and the IDF to hit back harder it they had been doing.

While Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday night publicly ordered the IDF to strike back against Hezbollah much harder, in fact, the Hezbollah targets struck were still limited and still showed restraint.

US President Donald Trump had continued to direct Israel to restrain its responses to Hezbollah violations even after those violations included rocket attacks into Israel itself, and not just on soldiers in southern Lebanon.

On Sunday, the IDF picked up its attacks on Hezbollah even more, but still at only a fraction of the intensity of the attacks prior to the April 17 ceasefire.

Many of the IDF’s attacks are from long range by artillery fire or fighter jets, whereas the IDF’s five divisions of infantry forces may actually be much smaller than normally expected.

If five divisions in Gaza in fall 2023 meant around 50,000 troops, some have said that the five divisions now could be closer to 1,000 troops, with each division using only a fraction of its forces so as not to need to call up too many reservists at once or for too long.

This would be to account for the unprecedented length of the war, as well as the anger among reservists that the government continues to lean on them for more rounds of service, while giving an exemption to the haredi sector.

In the meantime, the IDF continued to have to cope with ongoing rocket and drone attacks by Hezbollah both on IDF soldiers in southern Lebanon as well as in northern Israel.

Most of the drones and rockets were shot down.

However, some made it through Israeli defenses and even killed and wounded some IDF soldiers.

A rising new problem is First Person View (FPV) drones, which involve more manual direction of the drones in ways that make it harder to jam, track, or shoot them down.

FPV drones also require more highly trained drone operators, but the IDF has said that Hezbollah has increased the number of such operators.

In the background of the ongoing fighting, Israel and the Lebanese government, which seems to be trying to dislodge itself from Hezbollah, have held two rounds of normalization talks.

Senior Israeli officials have told their American counterparts that if Hezbollah continues attacking IDF soldiers, Israel will be unable to maintain its current measured response, according to two sources familiar with the discussions.

Last week,  Trump announced that the ceasefire would be extended for another three weeks following a meeting between Israel’s ambassador to the United States, Yechiel Leiter, and Lebanon’s ambassador to the United States, Nada Hamadeh Mouawad. Trump also said that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is expected to meet Lebanese President Joseph Aoun at the White House in the near future.

On Sunday evening, Netanyahu convened a small group of ministers along with senior security officials to discuss both Iran and the situation in Lebanon. One option under consideration is escalating strikes against Hezbollah, including targeting areas beyond southern Lebanon.

Earlier, at the start of the government meeting, Netanyahu acknowledged that the US administration is limiting the scope of Israel’s response.

“We are acting vigorously according to rules agreed upon with the United States—and, incidentally, with Lebanon as well. This means freedom of action not only to respond to attacks—that is clear—but also to thwart immediate threats and to address emerging threats,” Netanyahu said.

He added that Israel is not prepared to accept Hezbollah’s actions and that “we will do what is necessary to restore security to the north.”