Israeli gov't expected to extend evacuation orders along northern border

Two soldiers from the Givati Brigade special unit were killed in battles in the southern Gaza Strip, the IDF said Sunday. St.-Sgt. Narya Belete, 21, from Shavei Shomron, and St.-Sgt. Ido Eli Zrihen, 20, from Jerusalem were buried at the military cemeteries in Netanya and Mount Herzl in Jerusalem, respectively.

Sgt. Oz Daniel, 19, who was kidnapped by Hamas to the Gaza Strip on October 7, was killed by the terrorist group and is recognized as such, the IDF said Sunday. Daniel’s fate was unknown until the IDF chief rabbi ascertained his death.

“The uncertainty is overwhelming,” said Daniel’s mother, Merav, at a hostage protest in Kfar Saba on January 27. “I don’t know how my son is feeling, if he is eating, drinking, how he is being treated, if he has warm enough clothes. There are so many more questions. All the information that seems trivial for a mother to know are things I do not know at all.”

Daniel’s dream was music, she said, standing alongside Amir, her husband.

“We believe that what is helping him through this terrible time is his love for music, for rock, and his ability to respect and honor every person... The state abandons its soldiers – first on October 7 and a second time now,” she said. “We can’t let this happen; otherwise, why would parents want to draft their children? As the mother of a soldier, what rings in my mind every day is the Soldier’s Oath, where they swear from the bottom of their hearts to dedicate everything they have to the State of Israel, to protect it and its freedom.”

Daniel’s family and friends described him as a “loving man and a true friend, someone who believed in music’s ability to change the world,” the Kfar Saba Municipality said Sunday. He was buried in Kfar Saba on Sunday afternoon.

In the North, Hezbollah fired dozens of rockets and anti-tank missiles and sent drones into Israel on Sunday. At least 50 air-raid sirens were sounded over the course of the day, Home Front Command said Sunday evening. Recently, until Saturday and Sunday, most days had fewer than 10 air-raid sirens.

Kiryat Shmona Mayor Avichai Stern said all residents should leave immediately. In a recorded message, he warned local residents to “not take any excess risk. For anyone still in the city, this is the time to make a phone call and leave. Another day of massive fire with three rockets fired at our city. Thankfully, all rocket launches toward our city only landed in open fields.”

No casualties were reported.

Hezbollah operatives killed

Some of the attacks came after an alleged IDF airstrike killed two Hezbollah operatives near the Syria-Lebanon border in the early hours of Sunday morning, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and other foreign media reported. The attack took place between Homs province and Rif Dimashq, the reports said.

The IDF declined to respond to the reports.

The IDF has admitted to thousands of attacks in Syria over several years, but it rarely admits publicly to specific strikes to preserve plausible deniability and avoid retaliation. Most attacks are against weapons that Iranian proxies are trying to smuggle to Hezbollah or militias affiliated with Iran in Syria.

IAF fighter jets targeted and eliminated a Hezbollah terrorist cell in the area of Blida in southern Lebanon shortly after the cell exited a military compound, the IDF said Sunday. Two other military compounds in the area were also targeted.

Earlier, the Israeli air defenses shot down a suspicious aerial object after it penetrated Israeli airspace over the Upper Galilee from Lebanon.

Later in the afternoon, the IDF targeted the source of Hezbollah rocket fire directed toward the areas of Margaliot, Mount Dov, Kiryat Shmona, Menara, and Malkiya.

The government on Sunday said it expects to extend the evacuation for residents along the northern border until July 7. The idea is to provide stability for the residents to remain in their current “temporary” school settings and to not push them to return before the school summer vacation.

This does not mean that returning might not be possible earlier, but at least those residents who want some certainty about their children’s school situation, without having to hear each month if the situation will continue, can now count on finishing the school year where they have currently moved to.

The government could extend the evacuation even further if a larger war breaks out with Hezbollah. The pending July decision also was made in light of diplomatic efforts to prevent a full-scale war with Hezbollah and is in line with local government requests for great stability after the military had suggested a two-month extension to the evacuation situation.

The government said it would continue to pay for the cost of hotels or rent for evacuees’ temporary accommodations while they are displaced.

A diplomatic plan pushed by the US and France calls for fighters, including Hezbollah’s elite Radwan unit, to withdraw from the border with Israel to around the Litani River.

Many of the displaced residents of the South have already begun returning to their homes despite the situation in the North.

In Khan Yunis on Sunday, during efforts to evacuate the civilian population from combat zones, soldiers identified terrorists who attempted to escape by hiding among civilians who were evacuating. Some were apprehended by the IDF, while others were killed, the IDF said.

Soldiers were continuing their targeted raids on terrorist targets throughout the Gaza Strip, including in the northern Gaza area of Zeitoun. During one operation, infantry forces, including the Givati Brigade, located numerous weapons, including sniper rifles, AK-47s, grenades, and ammunition.

Troops located a terrorist cell that had been using drones, and the IAF eliminated several terrorists, the IDF said.

As part of the ongoing IDF activity in Zeitoun and in the central Gaza Strip, several terrorists were killed. Troops also located weapons and destroyed rocket launchers. A terrorist cell was identified as using drones in Shati and was eliminated by the IAF.

In the West Bank, 12 terrorism suspects were apprehended by security forces overnight, including three in el-Aroub and one in Nablus.

Some 3,200 terrorist suspects have been apprehended since October 7, with 1,350 of them associated with Hamas.

Reuters contributed to this report.