The Israel Defense Forces said Thursday night that it had finished clearing a “strategic” underground facility belonging to the Hezbollah terror group beneath a mountainous ridge in southern Lebanon in recent weeks.
The Ali Taher Ridge is located within Israel’s southern Lebanon buffer zone, near Nabatieh. According to the IDF, Hezbollah built tunnel systems beneath the hill, which served as the “nerve center” of the terror group’s Badr regional division — a unit tasked with the area of southern Lebanon that is north of the Litani River.
Dozens of Hezbollah operatives were believed to be holed up under Ali Taher when a new ceasefire took effect in June.
In a statement Thursday night, the IDF said that in the past few weeks, troops of the 36th Division, who had achieved “operational control of the ridge area above and below ground,” cleared two major tunnel routes under Ali Taher of Hezbollah operatives, killing some of them while others fled.
A military official said that control was achieved through “offensive operational activities” in recent weeks, including ambushes against the Hezbollah operatives who had been hiding there, and attacks on the tunnel shafts with gunfire, grenades, drones, and airstrikes. Hezbollah also launched several explosive drones at troops operating on the ridge in recent weeks, including on Wednesday.
