Hanin Ghaddar is the Friedmann Senior Fellow at The Washington Institute's Rubin Family Arab Politics Program, where she focuses on Shia politics throughout the Levant.
Ahmad Sharawi is a research assistant with The Washington Institute’sRubin Family Arab Politics Program. He specializes in political and economic affairs of the Levant, North Africa, and Gulf regions.
Articles & Testimony
A regularly updated visual tracker of northern border attacks by Hezbollah, the IDF, and Palestinian groups during the 2023 Hamas-Israel war.
Since war broke out on Israel’s southern frontier with Gaza in October, the country’s forces have also faced daily skirmishes with Lebanese Hezbollah to the north. Despite the limited geographical scope of these border clashes, many observers worry that their trajectory is one of dangerous escalation, with several Hezbollah attacks pushing beyond the normal rules of engagement, making greater use of advanced weapons (such as antitank missiles), or hitting different military targets (like the drone downed on October 29).
To minimize the risks of full-scale war, Hezbollah has simultaneously been playing a calculated and coordinated game of plausible deniability, often allowing other groups to launch rockets against Israel from south Lebanon. Yet its margin for error and miscalculation is shrinking every day, and even the limited escalation seen thus far has killed numerous Hezbollah fighters and displaced thousands of civilians in the south due to fears of another war. Israel has responded by bombing sites where missiles are launched and targeting some of Hezbollah’s military infrastructure, losing several soldiers in the process.
To better understand these trends and document individual attacks, the above map tracks all known incidents since the Gaza war erupted on October 7, 2023, and will continue adding new entries daily, marked as follows:
Blue pins: Israeli attacks
Yellow pins: Hezbollah attacks
Green pins: attacks claimed by Hamas (Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades)
Black pins: attacks claimed by al-Quds Brigades (Palestinian Islamic Jihad)
Orange pins: attacks claimed by al-Fajr Forces (al-Jamaa al-Islamiyah)
The pins represent approximate attack locations, with a precision radius ranging from zero to two miles. Click on a pin to show attack information, dates, and sources (which include Israeli, Lebanese, and wider Arab media outlets, social media posts by reporters, official Israeli and Hezbollah sources, and more).
Armed Factions in South Lebanon
Hezbollah: Lebanese Shia Islamist group formed in the 1980s, known for its paramilitary activities, deep opposition to Israel, and involvement in terrorist attacks against Americans and other Western powers operating in the Middle East. Functions as an Iranian proxy.
Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades: Military wing of the Palestinian organization Hamas. Operates primarily from Gaza but is also active in south Lebanon. Partly funded and armed by Iran.
Al-Quds Brigades: Armed wing of Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), funded by Iran. Active in Gaza, the West Bank, and south Lebanon.
Al-Fajr Forces: Military wing of the Lebanese Sunni organization al-Jamaa al-Islamiyah (the Islamic Group).
Abu Ali Mustafa Brigades: Armed wing of the Marxist-Leninist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). Had not claimed any attacks from Lebanon as of this map’s initial publication, but did announce that it was mobilizing.
