The IDF has achieved deeper penetration against Hezbollah during the current war with much less IAF support than it had during the invasion of Lebanon in 2024, the IDF's 7th Armored Brigade Col. Shaul Yisraeli told The Jerusalem Post Tuesday night.
“We saw that the enemy had reestablished itself after Operation Northern Arrows [in 2024],” he said in an interview. “We found large amounts of weapons and terrorists on that defense line… with less IAF support, we killed many terrorists with the help of artillery fire.”
Although the IAF has given some air support to IDF soldiers in Lebanon throughout the current war, the vast majority of its resources were focused on Iran until the April 7 ceasefire with Tehran.
In contrast, during the fall 2024 invasion of southern Lebanon, the full power of the IAF was used alongside IDF Ground Forces.
This may be one of the reasons why Yisraeli said Hezbollah has fought back harder on the ground during this round than it did in 2024.
It is good to know we could do this even without less air support,” he said.
The 7th Brigade is one of the IDF’s premier armored units. It has accompanied the 36th Division in a variety of critical battles in both Gaza and Lebanon in recent years.
The 36th Division, including the 7th Brigade, the Golani Brigade, commandos, and the Yahalom specialist combat engineers, was all involved in extended fighting moving from east to west in Lebanon from Rav Talatin to a-Taibah and eventually to Kantara.
This earlier stage of fighting along Hezbollah’s first defense line took about two to three weeks in March.
IDF continues attacks on underground tunnel network
The brigade continued with attacks on a Western vector toward Kantara with the goal of locating and destroying a two-pronged, enormous underground tunnel city network, Yisraeli said.
The northern section was referred to as “Acre,” the city in the North that has underground tunnels, and the southern section was referred to as “Arad,” the city in the South, he said.
Kantara is about 11 kilometers into southern Lebanon, roughly situated parallel to the midpoint of where Margaliot and Dovev are located on the Israeli side of the border.
“Arad” was the newer and even more advanced portion of the tunnel network, Yisraeli said, adding that there were significant signs of Iranian involvement in building both networks.
Earlier on Tuesday, the IDF cited evidence of Iranian involvement in building the Kantara tunnel network, including funding and planning, with certain modes of building and operating the tunnel that are uniquely Iranian in terms of being a higher level of professionalism compared with other Hezbollah tunnels.
Iranian weapons in Hezbollah tunnels
In addition, the IDF said it had found trademark Iranian weapons in the tunnel network.
Even if the IAF had been more involved, the Kantara tunnel networks were so deep and well-protected that they would have required ground forces to penetrate and destroy them, Yisraeli told the Post.
During the battle of Kantara, he said his forces had killed about 130 Hezbollah fighters.
Within the Kantara underground city tunnel network, the IDF had found 45 antitank missiles, Yisraeli told the Post. It was the largest single supply of missiles that had been found anywhere in southern Lebanon during this invasion, he said.
Seizing such a large supply of advanced and powerful missiles in one fell swoop was a major win for the IDF and a significant blow to Hezbollah.
Regarding the shaky April 17 ceasefire, Yisraeli said Hezbollah has still launched about 20 drones against his forces.
Nevertheless, this paled in comparison with Hezbollah’s drone attacks on his forces prior to the ceasefire, which involved a constant threat of hundreds of attack drones, he said.
Like many IDF officers, Yisraeli expressed some frustration that the April 17 ceasefire with Hezbollah has generally restrained him from initiating attacks farther into central or northern Lebanon to reduce the terrorist group’s long-range attacks on his troops.
On the one hand, Hezbollah is using strategic points nearby, but slightly farther North, to continue to regularly launch aerial attacks against his forces, he said. On the other hand, the ceasefire is not allowing him to secure those areas so that his forces would be less threatened, he added.
Overall, Yisraeli said he was pleased that his forces had helped eliminate Hezbollah forces in a large area and destroyed its Kantara underground tunnel network, the largest in southern Lebanon.