By Patrick Kingsley, Julian E. Barnes, Ronen Bergman and Natan Odenheimer

JERUSALEM — The Israeli military began a ground invasion of southern Lebanon, targeting what it said early Tuesday (Oct 1) was Hezbollah military infrastructure in villages close to the Israel-Lebanon border, the first such incursion by Israel into its northern neighbour’s territory in nearly two decades.

Israeli leaders approved the plans late Monday (Sept 30) night to send in troops, according to three Israeli officials.  And in a statement issued shortly before 2 a.m. Tuesday, the military said Israeli troops had begun crossing the border “a few hours ago” in order to target sites that “pose an immediate threat to Israeli communities in northern Israel”.

The officials said the plans involved operating in a narrow strip of land that lines the northern side of the border. The invasion force would consist of small groups of commandos accompanied by air cover, as well as artillery shells fired from Israel, the officials said. The officials spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military matters.

The invasion followed intense Israeli strikes across Lebanon over the past two weeks that have killed hundreds of people. Israel is attempting to force a conclusion to a war that began last October when Hezbollah started firing toward Israeli positions in solidarity with its ally Hamas.

Though the Israeli military announced its troops had “begun limited, localized and targeted raids against Hezbollah” targets, the plan could still evolve into a larger invasion. Thousands of additional troops have been deployed in northern Israel in recent days, leading to speculation about a broader and more prolonged operation.

US officials said earlier Monday that they believed the invasion would be a limited one. Israeli officials had assured their US counterparts that they did not intend to follow up the incursion with a bigger operation by conventional forces or by occupying parts of southern Lebanon. US officials said they believed the commandos would quickly pull back after the operation was finished.

The plan was approved as the Israeli military declared a closed military zone in three villages at the northern tip of Israel that have been badly damaged through nearly a year of shelling and rocket fire from Lebanon.

Earlier Monday, a reporter for The New York Times saw at least two dozen military Humvees heading toward the same area carrying troops in full combat gear, including night-vision goggles. Dozens of logistical trucks, some armoured, were also heading north. Intense explosions could be heard near the border late Monday, according to two of the few residents who have not evacuated the area.

The invasion plan followed days of smaller and briefer cross-border reconnaissance missions in which Israeli commandos prepared for the larger incursion.

Hezbollah said Monday that its forces would confront Israeli troops if they carried out a full invasion. “We will confront any possibility, and we are ready if the Israelis decide to enter by land,” Sheikh Naim Kassem, deputy to Hezbollah’s slain leader, Hassan Nasrallah, said in a televised statement. “The forces of the resistance are ready for a ground engagement.”

The group denied that its fighting power or arsenal had been significantly damaged in recent weeks by Israel’s bombardments, which have killed hundreds of people, including civilians.

Later, Hezbollah said in a statement that it had targeted Israeli troop movements across from Lebanese border towns. Rocket sirens were sounded in a number of northern Israeli border communities, including where the Israeli military has announced a “closed military zone.”

Israeli commando units had made brief incursions into Lebanon in recent days to prepare for a possible wider ground invasion, according to Israeli officers and officials as well as a senior Western official.

The raids were focused on gathering intelligence about Hezbollah positions close to the Israeli-Lebanese border, as well as identifying Hezbollah tunnels and military infrastructure, in order to attack them from the air or the ground, the seven Israeli and Western officials said. The officials spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive military matter. The Israeli military declined to comment.

Israel’s security Cabinet met Monday evening to discuss whether and when to launch a major ground operation in southern Lebanon. Israel occupied southern Lebanon from 1982 to 2000 and briefly invaded in 2006 during a month-long war with Hezbollah. It also invaded southern Lebanon in 1978.

Before midnight, loud explosions could be heard and flashes of light could be seen in Dahiya, the densely populated area just south of Beirut where the Israeli military had issued fresh evacuation warnings. The Israeli military had called on Lebanese in and around three building complexes in the Dahiya to evacuate the areas, saying they were near Hezbollah targets.

The Israeli military also said Monday night that three areas in northern Israel had been declared “a closed military zone.”

Israeli officials previously told the Biden administration that the commando units were conducting “limited operations focused on Hezbollah infrastructure near the border” between Israel and Lebanon, Matthew Miller, a US State Department spokesperson, told reporters Monday.

“Israel has a right to defend itself against Hezbollah,” Miller said, adding, “We want to ultimately see a diplomatic resolution to this conflict.”

He blamed Hezbollah for starting the current conflict by launching cross-border rocket attacks on Israel a day after the Oct. 7 Hamas-led attack on Israel. He said a US-led proposal for a 21-day cease-fire between Israel and Hezbollah remained on the table.

President Joe Biden asked about reports of Israeli operations inside Lebanon, told reporters at the White House: “I’m more aware than you might know and I’m comfortable with them stopping. We should have a cease-fire now.”

But Yoav Gallant, the Israeli defence minister, told mayors from Israeli towns along the Lebanese border that “the next stage of the war against Hezbollah will soon commence.” He said it would “constitute a significant factor in changing the security situation” along the border and allow Israelis who had fled Hezbollah rocket fire to return home.

Israeli reservists were seen gathering at assembly points in northern Israel on Monday night in preparation for a potential ground manoeuvre in Lebanon.

Officials said that if a broader operation into southern Lebanon proceeded, Israel was expected to try to destroy Hezbollah military infrastructure near the border, rather than to advance deep into Lebanon and occupy large areas of the country. Southern Lebanon is a rugged area, filled with steep valleys in which militants can easily ambush an invading army, a factor that may have shaped Israeli military planning.

The plans suggest that Israel was seeking to capitalize on Hezbollah’s disarray, after it killed much of the group’s senior leadership in recent weeks, including Nasrallah.

The Israeli government’s declared goal is to make the border area safe enough for tens of thousands of Israelis displaced by Hezbollah rocket fire over the past year to return to their homes. The Lebanese health ministry said 95 people had been killed and 172 wounded in Israeli strikes in the past 24 hours. Hundreds of thousands of Lebanese civilians had also been displaced by heavy Israeli bombardment in Lebanon.

For nearly a year, Israel and Hezbollah have been firing deeper into each other’s territory, but they avoided an all-out war until September when Israel targeted Hezbollah’s senior leaders and blew up hundreds of Hezbollah’s pagers and radios.

Two Lebanese officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military manoeuvres, said Lebanese soldiers were withdrawing from a number of military posts Monday in southern Lebanon because of the possible Israeli incursion. One of the officials said the withdrawal aimed to avoid confrontations with Israeli soldiers. The Lebanese army, funded and trained in part by the United States, is loyal to the Lebanese government and distinct from Hezbollah, which operates a powerful paramilitary in the country.

Since Israel began escalating the conflict two weeks ago, Hezbollah and its patron, Iran, have failed to respond with the intensity that many analysts and officials had anticipated. They assumed that if Israel began assassinating Hezbollah’s senior leadership, the group would begin firing thousands of missiles toward central Israel, overwhelming Israel’s air defence systems and taking out key infrastructure targets, including the Israeli power grid.

Instead, Hezbollah has fired brief barrages of rockets, mostly toward northern Israel, forcing thousands of Israelis to take cover in bomb shelters but failing to exact significant damage.

Iran has not directly intervened, with officials in Tehran, Iran’s capital, suggesting that they want to avoid a direct war with Israel.

On Monday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu released a video in English addressing the Iranian people, seeking to undermine their support for Iran’s leaders. “Don’t let a small group of fanatic theocrats crush your hopes and dreams,” he said, adding, “The people of Iran should know, Israel stands with you.”

Amid anticipation of a possible ground invasion, Israel has been striking deeper into Lebanon. The Israeli military said Monday that it was behind the overnight bombing of a residential building in central Beirut that killed members of a militant Palestinian group, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.

It was believed to have been the first Israeli strike in central Beirut since at least 2006, during the last major war between Israel and Hezbollah.

Hamas said Monday that another Israeli airstrike on a refugee camp for Palestinians in southern Lebanon had killed its leader in Lebanon, Fatah Sherif, as well as his family.

The Israeli military said Sherif had coordinated Hamas’ ties with Hezbollah.

-New York Times