Shafaq News-
Middle East
Senior Israeli
military commanders have openly questioned the purpose of maintaining ground
forces in southern Lebanon, warning that troops are being killed and wounded
without clear military objectives, as a fragile ceasefire with Lebanon
collapses in all but name.
The admissions,
relayed by field commanders to Israel Hayom, represent some of the most candid
internal criticism to emerge from the Israeli military since it re-entered
Lebanese territory. “There is no purpose in staying like this in
Lebanon,” senior field commanders told the Israeli outlet. “Brigade
commanders don’t understand what is wanted from them; they don’t understand
whether there is a ceasefire, whether we even want the ceasefire, or whether we
want it to fail.”
Above the
military bind sits a political ceiling —and it is American. “We have not
been this embarrassed in a long time,” a senior Israeli security official
told Israel Hayom on May 2. “We are caught in a strategic trap. On the one
hand, we cannot stop and withdraw from southern Lebanon, because that would be
an admission of defeat. On the other hand, we cannot advance or take the
initiative, because Trump is stopping us.” The description echoes what
other senior officers have called a “tangle,” neither permitted to
deploy full combat capabilities nor given the order to withdraw.
What the forces
are doing in the meantime has drawn its own criticism. Buildings are being
demolished across southern Lebanon at scale, yet by the commanders’ own
account, the campaign is not producing results. “The forces continue to
demolish buildings in southern Lebanon, but truly, the IDF [army] is not
achieving results in this fighting, as it is being conducted right now,”
senior field commanders told Israel Hayom.
NBC News and
the Washington Post documented the scope independently, reporting through
satellite imagery and on-record Lebanese officials that entire neighborhoods
have been leveled since April 16, with the mayor of Bint Jbeil confirming
approximately 1,500 residential buildings in his district alone completely
demolished.
Read more: Southern Lebanon counts a second toll beyond the dead: LANDS
Drone
Casualties and a Documented Unpreparedness
Central to the
internal reckoning is a Hezbollah drone campaign that has exposed critical gaps
in Israeli electronic warfare defenses. On Wednesday, the army confirmed that
an explosive drone wounded four soldiers in southern Lebanon, one severely.
Haaretz reported that in the week of May 17-18 alone, two soldiers and a
Defense Ministry employee were killed by similar devices, at least some immune
to electronic jamming, with the army conceding it had no adequate countermeasure.
The drone of
particular concern is the fiber-optic guided variant, which operates without a
radio signal and cannot be jammed through conventional systems. Hezbollah,
senior officers told Israel Hayom, used the post-November 2024 ceasefire period
following Operation Northern Arrows to rearm at a pace the army failed to fully
grasp. “The rehabilitation rate was higher than the rate at which the IDF
was degrading its capabilities,” one senior officer said, adding that the
true scale of Hezbollah’s recovery only became clear when the current campaign
began on March 2, 2026.
A Ceasefire
That Exists Only on Paper
Brokered by
Washington and effective at midnight between April 16 and 17, the ceasefire
followed weeks of intensified cross-border fighting linked to the broader
US-Israeli confrontation with Iran. It has since been extended twice, by three
weeks on April 23, then by a further 45 days on May 15, following a third round
of direct talks between Israeli and Lebanese officials in Washington. Neither party
has observed it consistently. Israel has continued conducting strikes inside
Lebanon; Hezbollah, in response, has continued launching attacks on Israeli
military positions and northern communities. “There is no ceasefire,”
one senior Israeli army field commander told Israel Hayom flatly.
According to an
AFP tally —the Israeli army does not publish cumulative figures— 21 soldiers
have been killed and an estimated 910 wounded in combat operations inside
southern Lebanon since March 2. The most recent fatality was confirmed on May
19, when a deputy company commander was killed during an exchange of fire with
Hezbollah in the southern Lebanese village of Qawzah.
Read more: Beirut’s southern suburb empties overnight
A Manpower
Crisis Compounding Strategic Drift
Approximately
90,000 reservists are currently serving in the Israeli army, more than twice
the number originally planned for 2026, Israel Hayom reported, with the burden
falling across conscripts, career personnel, and reservists alike. Addressing
division commanders, Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir cautioned that the army would
“collapse into itself” if the political echelon continues assigning
missions across Lebanon, Gaza, Syria, the West Bank, and the eastern border
without expanding the conscription base or providing adequate budget. Senior officers
quoted by Israel Hayom said that reservists are losing confidence in the
military leadership after two and a half years of fighting without a decisive
outcome on any front.
Israeli outlet
Walla, in late April, captured the civilian dimension, reporting that most of
Israel had returned to routine, but northern communities remained exposed.
“The mere fact that one must worry that an explosive drone might strike
the school bus carrying children is enough to paralyze with fear,” Walla
said, adding that businesses have not recovered and populations have dwindled.
Militarily, Walla assessed that the army could maneuver within the security
strip south of the Litani River but could no longer operate deep inside
Lebanese territory without triggering immediate drone retaliation.
Questions Over
the Previous Campaign’s Conduct
Beyond the
current phase, senior military figures have raised concerns about Operation
Northern Arrows itself, with reporting suggesting the army was absent from many
locations in southern Lebanon despite contrary public impressions. The gap
between stated and actual battlefield presence has intensified scrutiny of how
the current campaign is being measured. One senior officer told Israel Hayom,
“We are doing everything to hit them as much as possible, but
unfortunately, they are not taking enough hits.”
The Israeli
Security Cabinet last formally reviewed the southern Lebanon mission on April
15, 2026, backing Zamir’s directive to designate all territory up to the Litani
River as a no-go zone for Hezbollah operatives, a narrowing of scope that
reflected an institutional acknowledgment that the broader objective of fully
disarming Hezbollah exceeded available military means. The cabinet also
authorized Israeli envoys to enter US-hosted diplomatic talks, a mandate that
produced the May 15 ceasefire extension.
Defense
Minister Israel Katz separately instructed the army to raze the first line of
Lebanese border villages to eliminate anti-tank and infiltration threats. No
further formal review of mission objectives has been scheduled.
Read more: Ceasefire without sovereignty
