An armed terrorist opened fire Tuesday afternoon at Israeli troops near the border with Lebanon and was killed in an exchange of fire, the IDF said, in an unusual incident that prompted searches across the area and stay-at-home instructions for several nearby communities.
No Israeli troops were wounded. The military said the incident was still ongoing and that ground forces, trackers, special units and Israeli Air Force aircraft were searching the area.
The shooting took place near Ramim Ridge in the Upper Galilee, close to the Israeli communities of Manara, Margaliot and Misgav Am. The area lies along Israel’s northern border, where the IDF has been operating for months to push Hezbollah forces and infrastructure away from the frontier.
The incident began when troops from the IDF’s 769th Brigade identified a fire in the area and launched searches near Manara and Metula, including in areas across the border in southern Lebanon. During the searches, the terrorist opened fire at the troops, who returned fire.
After the exchange, soldiers found the terrorist’s body in what the army described as a security zone near the border. Israeli residents, however, said the terrorist had reached agricultural land inside Israel.
The IDF said the terrorist did not cross the international border into Israel, but the incident was still considered highly unusual because the area was supposed to have been cleared of armed operatives. The military is investigating how an armed terrorist, apparently carrying a rifle, reached the area and managed to fire at Israeli forces.
One possibility being examined is that the gunman was trying to draw troops into the area as part of a planned ambush. The army is also checking whether another terrorist or an accomplice was involved.
Following the shooting, the Upper Galilee security department instructed residents of Misgav Am, Margaliot and Manara to remain inside their homes until further notice. Route 866 was closed between Yiftah and Manara, and also between Tel Hai Junction and the road leading up to Ramim Ridge.
Eitan Davidi, head of the Margaliot local committee, told ynet that residents had warned such an incident could happen.
“We knew this would happen, and we warned about it,” he said. “When you show weakness and helplessness, they raise their heads, and when they raise their heads, we get hurt. And when soldiers are hurt, civilians will eventually be hurt too.”
“The terrorist arrived armed. This is Israeli territory. No one has anything to look for here, certainly not armed,” he added. “He came here and fired at our forces. Without eliminating Hezbollah, residents of the north will become a target. Today it is one terrorist, in a month it will be two terrorists and then a cell. They will not give up, and their goal is one thing: to massacre us.”
Davidi said the incident should be treated as a warning.
“Let no one be confused. This is the first, but it will not be the last,” he said. “Others will come after him if the State of Israel does not bring about a change in the equation. This is the dismantling of the north. No one will want to live under mortal danger because we saw what happened in the south, and if we do not draw conclusions from this serious incident, we are in very serious trouble.”
The Uri Tzafon movement, which advocates Jewish settlement in southern Lebanon as a security measure, called the incident “a burning and bleeding warning sign.”
“Experience proves again and again: a military security zone alone is not enough,” the group said. “Wherever the IDF clears the area but the state refuses to establish facts on the ground, terrorism returns, entrenches itself and threatens the residents of the Galilee again.”
The group said Israel must change its approach and “fix the border” by establishing civilian Jewish communities in southern Lebanon. “Only settlement will bring security to the residents of the north,” it said.
The incident came a day after a renewed ceasefire with Iran. Senior members of Israel’s Security Cabinet said Tuesday that Israel had decided any Hezbollah fire intended to cross the border into Israel would be met with an IDF strike in Beirut’s Dahiyeh district, a Hezbollah stronghold in the Lebanese capital, despite Iranian threats to respond to such attacks.
“We ordered the army to maintain the equation we set for Hezbollah, and this will be the test,” one senior Cabinet member said. “If there is fire meant to cross the fence toward our communities, we will fire at Dahiyeh, and we will see what happens in Iran.”
Israeli officials said that despite continued IDF strikes in southern Lebanon, especially in the Tyre area, Iran had not intervened on Hezbollah’s behalf.
“The IDF is deepening the maneuver,” officials said. “We are operating there with force and the Iranians are doing nothing. We are destroying the strategic infrastructure Hezbollah built in the Beaufort area. This is an event that will allow residents of the north to live in a corrected reality for the next 20 or 30 years.”
First published: 14:51, 06.09.26