IRGC officers said to flee Lebanon over fear of being targeted

Officer seriously wounded in Lebanon as strikes pound Hezbollah bastion near Beirut

Second soldier also wounded after troops ordered to push deeper into country; Lebanon says death toll in fighting up to 123 as thousands flee capital ahead of strikes on Dahiyeh suburb

An IDF officer was seriously wounded and another soldier was moderately hurt during fighting against Hezbollah in southern Lebanon, the military said Thursday, as Israel began a sweeping bombing campaign in the southern suburbs of Beirut.

The wounded officer marked the most serious casualty yet among Israeli troops since the ground forces began pushing deeper into southern Lebanon in recent days as part of an offensive in response to renewed cross-border rocket fire.

Both troops serve in the Givati Brigade. They were taken to a hospital for treatment, and their families were notified, the army said, without offering further details.

Hezbollah earlier claimed to have targeted Israeli troops with an anti-tank guided missile in southern Lebanon.

On Wednesday, two soldiers were moderately wounded by anti-tank fire in southern Lebanon.

The Israel Defense Forces has advanced further into southern Lebanon in recent days, with the military saying it assumed “forward defensive positions to establish an additional defensive layer to remove the threats to the residents of northern Israel.”

The developments came as Israel appeared to expand its offensive into Beirut’s southern suburbs Thursday night, launching a series of strikes on the Hezbollah stronghold after ordering all residents of the densely populated area known as the Dahiyeh to evacuate.

Traffic was gridlocked in Lebanon’s capital on Thursday as panicked residents tried to flee after Israel’s military issued an evacuation notice telling residents to “save your lives and evacuate your homes immediately,” and specified which routes they should take to escape.

Hours later, strikes began to hit the Beirut suburbs, with the IDF announcing before midnight that it had begun a “wave” of air strikes in Dahiyeh targeting Hezbollah’s terror infrastructure.

A report indicated that the campaign had also prompted an exodus of Iranian officers from the area.

Earlier, IDF chief Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir said during a televised address that he had “instructed Israeli army forces to move forward and deepen the line of control along the border, while establishing positions at key points in southern Lebanon.”

“We are striking with force, on the front line and deeper in Lebanon,” he said.

UN peacekeepers in southern Lebanon reported seeing and hearing clashes in the area as more Israeli forces have moved across the border, a spokesperson for the peacekeeping mission known as UNIFIL said Thursday. It was the first confirmation of combat taking place.

Israel launched its offensive after Hezbollah began attacking Israel earlier this week, in what the terror organization initially said was a response to Israel’s killing of Iran’s supreme leader, but has later claimed was a response to Israel’s continued presence and airstrikes in Lebanon since a November 2024 ceasefire.

Hezbollah continued firing rockets and drones into northern Israel on Thursday and early Friday morning, setting off sirens in the Acre area, Galilee, and the Golan Heights but appeared to pull back from firing at central Israel, amid concerns that it could be coordinating its fire with Iran. There were no immediate reports of impacts or injuries.

As it claimed several overnight attacks, Hezbollah also issued a warning in Hebrew ordering residents of Israeli towns near the Israeli border to evacuate, appearing to taunt Israel over its own warnings to Lebanese civilians ahead of airstrikes. Israel has said it is not evacuating northern towns.

“Warning to residents of northern settlements, you are ordered to evacuate all settlements located within five kilometers of the border,” the terror group said in a statement, accompanied by a map showing the area where residents should head south from.

“Your military’s aggression against Lebanese sovereignty and safe citizens [sic], the destruction of civilian infrastructure and the expulsion campaign it is carrying out will not go unchallenged,” it added.

Hezbollah, which is heavily funded and controlled by Tehran, is widely believed to have reignited rocket fire after over a year of tense calm in response to joint Israeli and US strikes on Iran this week that have plunged the region into war.

On Thursday, Yemen’s Houthis, another Iranian proxy, also warned it could join the conflict, with Abdul Malik al-Houthi threatening in a televised statement that “our fingers are on the trigger, ready to respond at any moment should developments warrant it.”

Two Hezbollah rockets have hit northern Israeli towns so far this week, injuring one person. Israel has vowed to exact heavy consequences from the terror group in response to the attacks.

Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich warned Thursday that the southern suburbs of Beirut would look like Gaza’s Khan Younis.

“You wanted to bring hell on us, we are bringing hell on you,” Smotrich said as he toured towns on Israel’s border with Lebanon. “Dahiyeh will look like Khan Younis, and our citizens of the north will live in peace and quiet.”

According to Lebanon, 123 people have been killed in Israel’s strikes, and over 83,000 people had evacuated before Thursday’s evacuation order.

The evacuation order rattled Lebanese authorities, with President Joseph Aoun calling his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron in an urgent bid to halt the anticipated widespread strikes, according to a statement from his office.

Macron issued a statement calling for an end to the conflict and announcing that Paris will send aid to Lebanon, in the first apparent diplomatic endeavor to end the boiling conflict.

“Hezbollah must immediately cease its fire toward Israel. Israel must refrain from any ground intervention or large-scale operation on Lebanese territory,” the French president said in a post on X, adding that he has communicated with US President Donald Trump, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Lebanon’s top political leadership.

He called on Hezbollah to disarm and said he supports Beirut’s endeavors to deploy the military to assert full control over the country’s territory.

Hadi Kaakour, a resident of Beirut’s southern suburbs who was fleeing said he is not sure that even after leaving he will be safe.

“We don’t put anything past [Israel], they will strike us no matter where we go,” he said.

Others expressed frustration at Lebanon being pulled into the larger war in the Middle East.

“We got sucked into a mess that we have nothing to do with,” said Yousef Nabulsi, another fleeing resident. “People have been displaced and are now staying on the streets, and this is wrong.”

Among those fleeing were dozens of officers in Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, according to Axios, which said they left Lebanon in the past two days over fears they could be targeted by Israel.

Citing senior Israeli defense officials and a third source with knowledge of the matter, the news site said most of the officers were from the Quds Force — the overseas branch of the IRGC — and serve as military advisers to Hezbollah, with significant sway over their Lebanese proxy’s operations.

“We expect the IRGC exodus from Lebanon to continue over the next several days,” one of the Israeli defense officials was quoted as saying.

The report added that a small group of Iranian officers is expected to remain in Lebanon to maintain the Quds Force’s presence and liaise with Hezbollah.