The Israel Defense Forces are launching the Northern Shield Operation to search for and destroy the Lebanese Shiite Hezbollah tunnels leading to the territory of the Jewish state. This was announced on Tuesday during a briefing for foreign journalists by the official representative of the Israeli military, Jonathan Conricus.
“We are announcing the start of the Northern Shield Operation, the purpose of which is to detect and destroy the cross-border tunnels that Hezbollah is digging from Lebanon to Israel,” said a spokesman for the Israeli army. – We did not mobilize reservists but strengthened our troops in the north. The Northern Command is on high alert and ready for various unforeseen circumstances and scenarios. “
“Despite the fact that the tunnels [from Lebanon] cross the border of Israel, they are not yet ready for use, and there is no immediate threat to Israeli civilians,” Conricus continued. “We know about several tunnels, but at this stage, I will not indicate their number, we run this operation to find and neutralize all these tunnels. “
Conricus added that the army declared the zone near the border fence near the city of Metulla in northern Israel a closed military zone. The military representative noted that the operation will be conducted only on Israeli territory, including a part of the Golan Heights controlled by the Jewish state.
In a statement by the army press service, the creation of Hezbollah’s attacking tunnels is called “a flagrant violation of Israeli sovereignty, once again demonstrating that the Hezbollah terrorist organization disregards UN resolutions, including UN Security Council resolution 1701.
On Monday evening, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met with US Secretary of State Michael Pompeo in Brussels. According to the statements of the Israeli side, at the talks with the head of the American diplomacy, the prime minister discussed ways to “contain the aggression of Iran and its partners in the north of Israel,” including Lebanon, Syria and Iraq.
