At Northern Command handover ceremony, generals say enemy will never again be allowed to entrench themselves on border

Maj. Gen. Ori Gordin ends his tenure as chief of the Northern Command after three years, handing over the reins of the unit to Maj. Gen. Rafi Milo, the former commander of the Home Front Command.

At the handover ceremony, Gordin says that “for many long years, we allowed the threat of a terror organization to grow and entrench itself on our northern border; this is an operational and strategic mistake, mine and my predecessors’, a grave mistake that must not be repeated.”

“A mistake which, as a result of it and due to the great risk to the residents, the State of Israel evacuated tens of thousands of residents from their homes for their protection. And now, with this severe threat removed, we are commanded to ensure that no other threat grows in its place,” he says, referring to Hezbollah.

Gordin says that the military’s directive must be to “maintain the good security situation in the north and to thwart any threat that tries to form from the north or the east.”

Milo says Israel’s “security reality” in the north of the country is “fragile.”

“We are required to continue, preserve and deepen the achievements of the war, to shape a safer and improved security reality, to maintain freedom of action, and to complete the return of all northern residents to their homes in safety,” he says.