Captured Hezbollah fighters say they’re ‘terrified,’ terror group collapsing, Gallant tells troops on northern border

Defense Minister Yoav Gallant tells IDF troops that Hezbollah operatives captured and interrogated by Israel are “terrified” and that the Iran-backed terror group is “collapsing.”

“The prisoners tell us what’s happening, that they’re terrified because they know that they don’t have what it takes to deal with what’s happening. Not in terms of strength, combat ability, precision or determination,” he tells troops of the IDF’s 98th Division.

“This whole great formation they call Hezbollah is collapsing.”

The IDF last week published footage of an alleged member of Hezbollah’s elite Radwan forces being interrogated about the terror group’s plans in southern Lebanon and the current state of its operations.

A member of Hezbollah’s elite Radwan forces is seen in an interrogation video published October 15, 2024. (Israel Defense Forces)

“We are moving from a situation of defeating the enemy village by village, to destruction — blowing up the tunnels and the ammunition depots, and dismantling Hezbollah,” he tells troops.

“The result is that in every place that Hezbollah was waiting and preparing to raid [Israeli] border town, there are IDF soldiers.”

“Our goal is to completely clean this area so that residents can return to their homes and their lives,” he says, referring to Israel’s recently added war goal of returning tens of thousands of northern residents who have been displaced since Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attack, when Hezbollah began attacking northern Israel on a near-daily basis the day after.