On truce anniversary, Israel strikes Hezbollah as Lebanese PM criticizes terror group

PM Nawaf Salam says IDF’s repeated strikes belie Hezbollah claim it must remain armed to deter Israeli attacks; IDF says it has killed 370 terror operatives since ceasefire

The IDF confirmed launching a wave of strikes on southern Lebanon Thursday — the first anniversary of the ceasefire largely ending the cross-border fighting last year — saying it hit rocket-launching sites, weapon depots and military posts belonging to Hezbollah.

“The presence of the infrastructure and the activity of the Hezbollah terror organization in these areas constitute a violation of the understandings between Israel and Lebanon,” the military said.

Israel has escalated strikes in Lebanon in recent weeks, accusing Hezbollah of rebuilding in violation of the ceasefire deal that ended over a year of violence, including two months of open warfare.

Lebanon has faced US and Israeli pressure to disarm Hezbollah in accordance with the ceasefire, which envisions the Lebanese military and international peacekeeping force UNIFIL controlling southern Lebanon. Hezbollah has refused to give up its weapons.

On Thursday, Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam offered rare criticism of Hezbollah, saying the terror group’s claim that its weapons deterred enemy attacks did not hold water.

“Hezbollah says its weapons are deterring an aggression. Deterrence means preventing the enemy from carrying out an aggression, but [Israel] is attacking and the weapons are not deterring it,” Salam said in comments run by state-run National News Agency.

The Israeli strikes came shortly before Pope Leo XIV is scheduled to visit Lebanon on Sunday.

Although the pope will visit Beirut and other parts of the country, he will not go to south Lebanon, where Israel has frequently targeted Hezbollah. Simmering tensions with Hezbollah reached a fever pitch after Israel on Sunday killed Hezbollah’s military leader in a rare post-ceasefire strike on Beirut.

IDF: Over 370 terror operatives killed since ceasefire deal

Marking a year to the ceasefire agreement, the IDF said Thursday that it had killed over 370 terror operatives in Lebanon since the deal was signed on November 27, 2024.

Most of the slain terror operatives were members of Hezbollah, while others were from allied groups, including Hamas, according to the IDF. The operatives were targeted by airstrikes for violating the terms of the truce, the IDF said.

The military did not include an estimate of how many civilians were killed in southern Lebanon. On Thursday, the UN’s rights office said Israel had killed at least 127 civilians, including children, in its strikes on Lebanon since the ceasefire deal.

Meanwhile, the Lebanese health ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants, said more than 330 people have been killed in Lebanon since the ceasefire deal.

Under the terms of the ceasefire, Hezbollah was required to vacate southern Lebanon, while Israel was given 60 days to do so. The IDF later withdrew from all but five posts along the border with Lebanon, citing the incomplete dismantling of Hezbollah’s infrastructure in the country’s south.

In addition to hundreds of airstrikes amid the ceasefire, the military said, ground troops have conducted over 1,200 raids and other small operations in southern Lebanon, mostly in areas surrounding the five “strategic” border posts, to prevent Hezbollah from restoring its capabilities.

The operations included demolishing terror infrastructure, thwarting Hezbollah intelligence collection efforts, and other activities to damage the terror group’s capabilities, the army said. During the raids, troops located numerous weapons, rocket-launching sites, and other buildings used by Hezbollah, the army added.

Israel invaded Lebanon in September 2024 in a bid to secure the return home of some 60,000 residents displaced by Hezbollah’s near-daily attacks on northern Israel starting October 8, 2023 — a day after fellow Iran-backed group Hamas invaded southern Israel, sparking the war in Gaza.

The start of the invasion was accompanied by massive airstrikes on Beirut and other areas that decimated Hezbollah’s leadership, leaving the group politically and militarily weakened after the war.