IDF Officer Cpt. Recanati Killed; 100 Hezbollah Targets Struck Over Weekend
The Israel Defense Forces named the officer killed in Friday’s Hezbollah drone strike in southern Lebanon as 24-year-old Capt. Maoz Israel Recanati, a platoon commander in the Golani Brigade’s 12th Battalion from Itamar, the Times of Israel reported. A statement from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Recanati had been due to marry his fiancée, Rani, in a month: “We all embrace her and his loved ones during this difficult time.” The IDF said it struck approximately 100 Hezbollah targets across southern Lebanon over the weekend, including surveillance posts and weapon depots, and shot down several Hezbollah drones that triggered sirens in Western Galilee border communities.
Recanati is the seventh IDF soldier killed in southern Lebanon since the ceasefire began, and the twentieth since hostilities escalated amid the Iran war; a civilian contractor has also been killed. Lebanon’s state National News Agency reported strikes on more than two dozen villages on Saturday, including one more than 50 kilometres from the border, and a renewed exodus of residents toward Sidon and Beirut. UN Secretary-General António Guterres “welcomed” Friday’s 45-day ceasefire extension and urged all actors to “fully respect the cessation of hostilities”. Hezbollah formally opposes the Washington-mediated talks, accusing the Lebanese government of offering “a series of free concessions” to “the enemy”.