The IDF said on Wednesday that it is drawing down some of its height of wartime forces on the Lebanese border, moving Division 146 further inland for other missions, while leaving Division 91 on the border.
In addition, Division 210 retains responsibility for the Syrian border and Mount Dov.
This decision comes after a full six months of quiet on the border with Lebanon in which Hezbollah has essentially presented no threat.
Not only that, but the IDF has been almost daily killing Hezbollah members who either try to move into southern Lebanon or are involved in weapons smuggling, leading to a total of 190 kills over the six months.
Further, the IDF retains its five outposts in southern Lebanese territory, which include around 500-1,000 soldiers.
Hezbollah is not allowed back in southern Lebanon
All of this IDF activity has meant that only 50 out of 16,000 destroyed Lebanese houses in southern Lebanon are in the process of being rebuilt.
To the extent that Hezbollah is not allowed back into southern Lebanon and many of the villages there were full of Hezbollah terrorists, this could mean that most do not return, or that their return could be heavily delayed.
This may be the IDF's biggest accomplishment as the greatest concern for the military was that once large groups of southern Lebanese returned to their villages, hundreds or more Hezbollah forces would also return under the guise of being unarmed villagers, but with weapons concealed in various places.
Given these accomplishments, IDF Northern Commander Maj. Gen. Uri Gordon congratulated IDF Division 146 Chief Brig. Gen. Yiftach Norkin and his troops on their major role against Hezbollah over the last approximately 20 months.
In addition, the IDF said that 60-70% of northern residents have returned out of the 60,000-80,000 who had evacuated for much of the war, though they noted that the numbers vary significantly from village to village.
Moreover, the IDF said that an even larger percentage of returnees were expected between the end of this school year in June and the start of the next school year in September.
Despite those accomplishments, the IDF said that Hezbollah remains a threat with as many as hundreds of medium to long range rockets, as well as many thousands (though less than 10,000) shorter range rockets and at least several hundred drones.
These numbers also can vary wildly as Hezbollah is constantly trying to locally produce as well as smuggle in from Iran and others, additional weapons.
While IDF attacks have substantially harmed Hezbollah's ability to rearm itself and the new Sunni regime of Ahmed al-Sharaa in Syria has blocked many of their smuggling efforts since Hezbollah is affiliated with Shiite Iran, this does not mean that they completely lack any capacity to rearm.
Accordingly, IDF Division 91, commanded by Brig. Gen. Yuval Gaz, which includes at least three reservist brigades that rotate in and out of service with other brigades, will maintain northern border security.
Also, the IDF said that its intelligence collection apparatuses, both mobile and stationary, are heavily improved since before the war as are its many new defensive capacities for tracking and shooting down any potential Hezbollah aerial threats.
During the war, Hezbollah effectively used drones to outfox existing Israeli air defenses, such as Iron Dome, but Israel has worked on a variety of new defenses as well as modifying Iron Dome to be more ready for such future attacks.
In addition, the IDF believes the Lebanese army has made some real progress in ousting Hezbollah from large parts of southern Lebanon, while it also has given space to the IDF to operate at its five forward outposts.
Regarding Syria, the IDF said it has deconfliction mechanisms in place to avoid striking forces it wishes to avoid harming, while focusing its attacks on targets it views as a threat.
