2 soldiers wounded in Hezbollah rocket attack; IDF strikes terror group’s sites

Two Israeli soldiers were wounded when a rocket launched from Lebanon by the Hezbollah terror group struck an army position near the border community of Menara on Tuesday.

The Israel Defense Forces said the pair were listed in light and moderate condition, and were taken to a hospital for treatment.

Hezbollah claimed responsibility for the attack, as well as six others along the border on Tuesday, targeting IDF bases and Israeli communities with missiles and rockets.

In addition to projectiles, the IDF said a “suspicious aerial target” — likely a drone — launched from Lebanon was downed over the border area by air defenses.

Meanwhile Tuesday, the IDF said fighter jets struck buildings used by Hezbollah in southern Lebanon’s Ayta ash-Shab, Mays al-Jabal, and Odaisseh.

In Marwahin, the IDF said it struck a Hezbollah operative who was spotted at an observation post.

The operative was identified by a surveillance soldier of the 869th Combat Intelligence Collection Unit, and within a short while an airstrike was carried out by a fighter jet against the site, the IDF said.

Additional Hezbollah infrastructure was hit in Naquora and Kafr Kila, the IDF added.

Also Tuesday, the IDF announced the formation of a new regional brigade on the border with Syria and Lebanon.

The “HeHarim,” or Mountains, Brigade, will be tasked with the Mount Hermon and Mount Dov regions, under the 210th “Bashan” Division, replacing the existing 810th “Hermon” Regional Brigade.

The IDF said the new brigade is formed “as part of the operational response to the situation on the northern border and in accordance with the situational assessment.”

“The brigade will specialize in combat in difficult terrain and warfare in mountainous areas,” the IDF said.

It said that the Mountains Regional Brigade would begin its activity in the coming weeks and that Col. Liron Appleman will be appointed its first commander.

Alleged Israeli airstrikes said to hit Hezbollah arms depots in Syria

Earlier Tuesday, alleged Israeli strikes in the predawn darkness hit military sites near Damascus, causing damage, Syria said, as a war monitor claimed Hezbollah arms depots were targeted in the attack.

A military source quoted by Syria’s state-run SANA media outlet said Israeli “air aggression” had targeted several military positions near Damascus at 2:10 a.m.

“Our air defenses took action and shot down several missiles,” the source said. The report said the strikes had caused “material losses,” without elaborating.

Syria is thought to regularly inflate the effectiveness of its air defenses against Israeli strikes, which have repeatedly targeted areas around the country as part of a decade-long campaign to stymie weapons transfers to  Hezbollah in Lebanon and keep Iran-backed fighters from gaining a foothold near Israel’s border.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the strikes targeted warehouses storing weapons for Hezbollah.

The UK-based opposition watchdog, which has been accused of exaggerating the effectiveness of Israeli strikes, said the attack destroyed weapons and ammunition, causing secondary explosions and fires.

The Observatory said it was the second such strike in two days, coming after raids on Sunday hit a Hezbollah weapons depot and a separate site near Damascus.

Earlier this month, an Israeli strike reportedly killed an Iranian Revolutionary Guards official and two other people in Baniyas on Syria’s Mediterranean coast.

The IDF said last week it had hit about 4,500 Hezbollah targets in Lebanon and Syria since the start of the ongoing war in Gaza.

According to the IDF’s estimates, more than 300 Hezbollah operatives have been killed, including five senior commanders, and 750 have been wounded by Israeli strikes across five months of daily skirmishes along the border.

Israel has for years carried out attacks on what it has described as Iran-linked targets in Syria, where Tehran’s influence has grown since it began supporting Syrian President Bashar Assad in a civil war that started in 2011, but rarely comments on them publicly.

Since the Hamas terror group’s brutal October 7 massacres, which saw some 1,200 people killed in Israel and 253 kidnapped, mostly civilians, Israel has escalated its strikes on Iranian-backed terror targets in Syria and has also struck Syrian army air defenses and some Syrian forces.

Starting October 8, Hezbollah-led forces have attacked Israeli communities and military posts along the Lebanese border on a near-daily basis, with the group saying it is doing so to support Gaza and the Hamas terror group, which Israel has vowed to destroy.

According to Israel’s military, since the war broke out it has hit weapons depots, buildings used by Hezbollah for attacks, more than 150 observation posts along the border, some 70 command centers where terror operatives were gathered, more than 50 significant rocket launching positions, and dozens of squads carrying out anti-tank missile attacks.

Hezbollah has named more than 240 members who have been killed by Israel since October 8. Another 40 operatives from other terror groups have also been killed in strikes on southern Lebanon, as well as a Lebanese soldier and at least 30 civilians, three of whom were journalists.

The near-daily exchange of fire along the shared Israel-Lebanon border has killed seven civilians in Israel and 10 IDF soldiers and reservists.