JERUSALEM 

The Israeli army said Thursday that Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi and Shin Bet security agency director Ronen Bar conducted a joint security assessment in southern Lebanon for the first time.

A military statement noted that Halevi and Bar “conducted a joint situational assessment with the forces fighting in southern Lebanon, along with the Commanding Officer of the Northern Command and the Commanding Officer of the 91st Division.”

According to Israel’s Yedioth Ahronoth daily, this marks the first time that senior military leadership has held a meeting inside Lebanese territory.

In early October last year, Israel announced the beginning of a ground incursion into southern Lebanon as part of its ongoing war against the country since Sept. 23.

The Lebanese Hezbollah group, however, has repeatedly claimed to have repelled Israeli advances, causing casualties among Israeli forces.

The Israeli military has acknowledged losses but has struggled to secure a breakthrough on the ground.

Israel has been mounting massive airstrikes across Lebanon against what it claims are Hezbollah targets since Sept. 23 that have killed more than 1,351 people and injured over 3,800.​​​​​​​

The aerial campaign is an escalation of the year-long cross-border warfare between Israel and Hezbollah since the start of Tel Aviv’s brutal offensive on the Gaza Strip, which has killed nearly 42,000 people, mostly women and children, since a cross-border incursion by the Palestinian group Hamas on Oct. 7 last year.

The overall death toll from Israeli attacks on Lebanon has risen to 2,169, with 10,212 injured since Oct. 8, 2023, according to Lebanon’s Health Ministry.

Despite international warnings that the Middle East region is on the brink of a regional war amid Israel’s relentless attacks on Gaza and Lebanon, Tel Aviv expanded the conflict by launching a ground invasion into southern Lebanon on Oct. 1.

*Writing by Mohammad Sio