IDF says it has finished clearing out Hezbollah’s Ali Taher Ridge facility ahead of demolition

The IDF announces that it has completed clearing out Hezbollah’s underground facility beneath the Ali Taher Ridge in southern Lebanon, ahead of its demolition.

In a statement, the military says that in the past few weeks, troops of the 36th Division, after achieving “operational control of the ridge area above and below ground,” cleared two tunnel routes of Hezbollah operatives, killing some of them while others fled.

The IDF describes the facility as a “strategic infrastructure that was built over two decades,” which it says was financed and planned by Iran.

Inside the tunnels, the troops found “command centers, weapons rooms, generator rooms, living quarters, showers, and a kitchen,” which the IDF says enabled Hezbollah operatives “to conduct fighting and remain there for extended periods.”

The IDF says that now that the underground site has been cleared of Hezbollah operatives, it is working to demolish it.

“Upon completion of the activity, the IDF will establish a renewed defensive posture in accordance with the situational assessment,” the military says, indicating that it plans to withdraw from the area.

The military says that Hezbollah operatives launched attacks from the underground site at the ridge.

“Following the activity in the [tunnel] routes in recent weeks, the ability to carry out terror attacks against Israeli civilians and IDF troops from the routes has been neutralized,” the statement adds.

Contrary to a report by Reuters earlier today, which said that a dozen members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, including at least two senior officers, were with Hezbollah operatives at the underground site beneath the ridge, the Israeli military says it has cleared the tunnel routes of all terror operatives. There is also no indication that IRGC members were inside the tunnels when the IDF captured them.

The earlier Reuters report also falsely claimed that the IDF had “put off storming” Ali Taher, despite the military being inside the tunnels for several weeks.