Israel-Gaza War: Israeli Minister Warns Hezbollah Over Border Fighting

Israel’s military will act to remove Hezbollah from the border with Lebanon if its attacks continue, an Israeli minister has warned.

Benny Gantz said the Israel Defense Forces would intervene if the world and Lebanese government did not stop militants firing on northern Israel.

Time for a diplomatic solution was running out, he added.

Cross-border exchanges of fire have been escalating since Hamas’s 7 October attacks on Israel.

It has led to concerns the conflict in Gaza could become wider across the region.

“The situation on Israel’s northern border demands change,” Mr Gantz told a press conference on Wednesday night.

“The stopwatch for a diplomatic solution is running out. If the world and the Lebanese government don’t act in order to prevent the firing on Israel’s northern residents, and to distance Hezbollah from the border, the IDF will do it.”

Mr Gantz, an opposition politician and former IDF chief of staff, joined Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s war cabinet as minister without portfolio in the wake of the attacks by Hamas.

There has been an increase in rocket fire and the use of weaponised drones by Hezbollah this week, with Israeli war planes quick to respond.

State media in Lebanon reported on Wednesday that a Hezbollah fighter and two of his relatives had been killed in an Israeli air strike.

The attack reportedly hit a house in Bint Jbeil, a town about 2km (1.2 miles) from the border with Israel.