BBCIsraeli army vehicles littered the dirt road where we crossed into Lebanon, punching a hole in the fence marking the armistice line drawn between the two countries a generation ago.
The ceasefire itself is already bad.
Israel’s ground attack on the border last week was launched, it said, to destroy Hezbollah’s weapons and infrastructure in “limited, localized, targeted attacks”.
Ten days later, the soldiers were taking us to a village a few kilometers away in the Lebanon area, where they had just established “some level of control”.
We were told that we could not reveal its location, due to war reasons, and our movements were restricted.
Israeli artillery was exploding in the air as we arrived. The military commander, Col Yaniv Malka, told us that the area is still clear of Hezbollah fighters.
The small-arms fire was from a battle that was going on at a distance of 500m, he said, describing a “face-to-face battle” with Hezbollah soldiers in the middle of the village a few days ago – meaning, he said, “my soldiers see it in their eyes, and you fight them in the streets.”
All along the middle road, houses were demolished; a pile of debris that gives glimpses of family life. Buildings left standing are shot with guns, missing corners or walls and covered with gunshots and holes.
Two tanks were sitting on the ground near what used to be the village square. The level of destruction around them reminds us of Gaza.
Our movement on the ground was restricted by the soldiers to the limited area of the village, but the neighboring buildings and communities were visible, far away, untouched.
These attacks appear – so far – to be “limited and targeted” geographically rather than militarily.
A painting on a building controlled by the military reads: “We wanted peace, you wanted war”.
“Most of the terrorists ran away,” Col Malka told me. “[But] a number of houses were in foreclosure. When we went from house to house, we found booby-traps and weapons. We had no choice but to destroy them.”
We have only the army’s account of what happened here.
We were also shown three weapons that were found inside civilian homes here, including new machine guns, new anti-tank missiles and mines, and improved shoulder rockets and night scopes.
Another anti-tank missile we saw was already partially assembled.
EPAThe chief of staff at the 91st Division, Roy Russo, also showed us a garage that he said was being used as a storage area, with sleeping bags, body armor, guns and ammunition hidden in a large barrel.
“This is what we call a place of exchange,” he said. “They are turning civilians into fighters. All of this gear is designed to fit inside [Israel] and perform duties on the part of Israel. This is not a defense mechanism.”
This, says Israel, is why it launched its attack on southern Lebanon; that a large number of Hezbollah weapons and equipment on the border were planning a cross-border attack similar to last year’s October 7 attack by Hamas in southern Israel.
At the start of the attack, the army revealed that Israeli special forces had been operating on the Lebanese border in small tactical units for a year, carrying out more than 70 raids to find and destroy Hezbollah infrastructure, including underground tunnels – one of which, it said, was 30 meters long. (100ft) before the cease fire line with Israel and it was not completed.
Col Malka showed me some of the weapons he said the army received the day we arrived. They include a large IED, an anti-personnel mine, and a high-tech night-scope.
He said the soldiers found “two to three times” the amount of weapons they found in Gaza, with “thousands” of weapons and thousands of rounds of ammunition found in this city alone.
“We don’t want to hold these places,” he told me. “We want to remove all ammunition and weapons. After that, we expect that the people will come back, and understand that peace is better for them, and the control of terrorists over them is a bad thing. “
“But I will leave that to the ambassadors to solve,” he smiled.
After the last ground war between Israel and Hezbollah in 2006, the UN decided that Hezbollah must retreat north of the Litani River. The previous decision also ordered disarmament. There is no forced decision.
ReutersThat ground war in 2006 was a wake-up call for Israel. Iran-backed militias fought their army to stand still. For nearly 20 years, both sides have been avoiding — and preparing for — the next one.
Col Malka fought in Lebanon in that war. “This one is different,” he said.
When I asked why, he replied: “Because of the 7th of October.”
As we spoke, the sound of small arms fire grew louder. He said pointing to it. “These are my boys who fought in the casbah,” he said.
I asked the army spokesman if there were any women or children when the campaign started here. He replied that all residents had been given sufficient warning to leave.
Human rights group Amnesty International this week described Israel’s withdrawal warnings from southern Lebanon as insufficient and overly general, and said it did not absolve the country of its obligations under international law.
Israel’s ground attack is part of a dramatic escalation by Hezbollah over the past three weeks that has seen and intensified airstrikes in southern Lebanon and parts of Beirut.
Lebanon says more than 2,000 people have been killed, mostly during the latest escalation, and hundreds of thousands have been left homeless.
Hezbollah began firing rockets into northern Israel on October 8 last year, a day after a deadly attack by Hamas in southern Israel. The Iran-backed group says it is in solidarity with the Palestinians and has said it will stop firing if there is a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.
Israel accuses Hezbollah of using civilians as human shields. One commander described the ground war as an offensive operation to protect Israeli civilians – an attack to stop an attack, in other words.
But the speed with which the Israeli forces have been going through the villages along this border may be the first chapter in this story.
Hezbollah’s tactics have changed since the ground offensive began, with Israeli cities such as Metula – surrounded by Lebanon on three sides – reporting a decrease in direct fire from anti-tank missiles, and an increase in rockets fired without being seen from afar.
The assessment of many is that the Hezbollah fighters did not flee, but simply retreated back to Lebanon.
Israel already has four divisions lined up along the border – and a growing voice inside the country that this is the time, not just to roll back Hezbollah, but to remake the Middle East.
As the battle raged near the village, we were told to leave quickly, and we rushed to the convoy that was waiting for us.
Under the shadow of the growing conflict with Iran, Israel’s small success on this border does not change one important fact: in fact, this is not a border war, it is a regional war fought on the border.
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