Israel says capture of Ali al-Taher ridge completes its south Lebanon security zone

Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz said on Friday that the army's capture of the Ali al-Taher ridge in southern Lebanon completes the work of holding what Israel calls its security zone north of the border. The highland sits about 10 kilometres from Israel, rises some 600 metres, and looks over villages and roads that feed the city of Nabatiyeh.

The Israeli military said on Thursday night that it had established "operational control" after an operation that began in June, when thousands of troops surrounded an underground complex it described as one of Hezbollah's largest in Lebanon. Soldiers, it said, cleared two underground routes, killed some fighters and watched others flee. Katz said the next task is to neutralize the tunnels and deploy around the ridge so the group cannot return.

According to the Israeli account, the site held command rooms, weapons stores, generators, living quarters, showers and a kitchen, built over more than two decades with Iranian money. The ridge sits near the Litani River and at the edge of the strip Israel occupies, which French reporting puts at nearly 6 percent of Lebanese territory. Losing it would interrupt Hezbollah supply lines around Nabatiyeh.

A U.S.- and Iran-brokered ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon took effect on 20 June. Fighting dropped across most of the country and stayed concentrated on this hill. Katz tied the capture to a larger policy he shares with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu: Israel will not leave the security zone until Hezbollah is disarmed throughout Lebanon and the threat to the Galilee is gone. "The capture of Ali Taher is an important step towards achieving this goal," he said.

Hezbollah has not issued a formal operational comment on the claim of full control. Earlier it said Israel had "exaggerated the importance of Ali al-Taher." Reuters reported that Iran warned the United States last month it would answer forcefully if Israeli attacks on the ridge continued. Hours before Katz spoke, that warning was already on the record. The hill is now a test of whether the June ceasefire can survive a change of possession at one high point.

For residents of Kfar Rumman and nearby villages, the ridge is not an abstraction. Destroyed houses sit in its sightline. Roads to Nabatiyeh run under it. A force that holds the crest can see movement and can fire or prevent fire. That is why both armies spent the summer on a feature that does not appear in most ceasefire communiqués.

Katz's phrase "completion of the phase" matters. It treats the occupied strip as a finished line rather than a temporary buffer. Lebanese officials and Hezbollah's political allies will read that as a statement of duration. Israeli officials will read any Hezbollah attempt to re-enter the tunnels as a reason to stay. The June text did not settle that argument. The ridge now gives it a physical address.

What happens next is tactical and political at once. Engineers will try to collapse or seal the underground rooms. Infantry will have to hold a crest that can be mortared. Diplomats who want the June arrangement to hold will look for a quiet period after the announcement. If fire spreads from Ali al-Taher back toward the coast or the Bekaa, the "completed" zone will look less complete than Katz said it was on Friday.