There were placards indicating the names of the diseased at a makeshift cemetery that the Israeli army reportedly bulldozed to exhume bodies in the al-Tuffah neighbourhood of Gaza City.—AFP
Jerusalem: Israel’s Defence Minister Yoav Gallant declared on Monday that Israeli troops would soon be deployed near the country’s northern border with Lebanon, as tensions rise amidst the crisis in Gaza.
Gallant informed troops near the border with Gaza that additional forces would be deployed to Israel’s north. “They will very soon go into action […], so the forces in the north are reinforced,” Gallant said. He also mentioned that reservists would be gradually released “to prepare and come ready” for future operations.
Since the Israeli invasion against Gaza on Oct 7, the Lebanese-Israeli border has witnessed near-daily exchanges of fire between the Israeli army and Lebanon’s Hezbollah movement, a Hamas ally.
Hezbollah claimed responsibility for 10 attacks on Israeli army positions near the border, using Iranian-made Falaq-1 rockets. Israel, however, has not reported any strikes on military sites in the north.
Israel’s army chief Herzi Halevi stated earlier this month that the likelihood of war on the northern border has become “much higher.” He also mentioned that more than 200 people, most of them Hezbollah members, have been killed in south Lebanon by Israeli fire since October 7, according to a tally. On the Israeli side of the border, nine soldiers and six civilians have been killed, according to Israeli officials.
Gallant asserted that Gaza fighters were running out of supplies and ammunition, but the war against Hamas “will take months.”