500 Hezbollah targets destroyed: How has the IDF so far avoided 2006 war-style ambushes?

Since IDF Division 36 joined the invasion of Lebanon on October 2, it has destroyed around 500 Hezbollah targets and killed around 150 operatives.

IDF sources said that Division 36 is moving at a rapid pace in clearing areas of southern Lebanon for which it is responsible for removing Hezbollah weapons and military positions.

Although most of where Division 36 is operating is still classified, last week, the IDF publicized that Division 36 assisted the air force in an operation against Hezbollah fighters at Bint Jbeil.

The IDF has found and destroyed very large quantities of high-quality anti-tank missiles, including Kornet missiles and a variety of other weapons.

It has also destroyed or neutralized a large number of tunnels.

Ambushed by Hezbollah

Part of the stunning story of the southern Lebanon invasion to date is that the IDF has only suffered one major ambush.

Following the 2006 Second Lebanon War, which saw numerous Hezbollah ambushes of IDF invading forces, many observers have been surprised that the IDF has not suffered greater losses.

IDF sources attributed what so far has been a much better result, as compared to 2006, to a mix of the air force and artillery hitting Hezbollah in southern Lebanon for a year, along with the intense ramping up of strikes throughout Lebanon starting in mid-September last month.

These strikes not only killed the Hezbollah high command strategists across Lebanon but also, more specifically, most of the lower-level tactical commanders in southern Lebanon.

At the same time, the IDF said the invasion, now on its 10th day, is only at its beginning – despite some senior IDF officials suggesting it may be over within weeks.

To that extent, the IDF believes that over time it will also dramatically reduce Hezbollah’s rocket fire on the Israeli home front.

While in the early days of the invasion, the news focus was on the fact that Hezbollah had failed to fire thousands of rockets per day at Israel, as the invasion had drawn out without a clear end date, more attention was focused on daily injuries and some deaths from Hezbollah rocket fire.

If deaths and wounded were once relegated to the close to Lebanon's northern border towns, they are now also occurring further away Safed and in the much further away and larger Haifa area.

Around one-third of the country has been in virtual lockdown for several weeks, and there have been no active negotiations about ceasefire terms.