Iran Update, January 7, 2024 | Institute for the Study of War

Key Takeaways:

• The Israeli Defense Forces announced that it “dismantled” the 12 Hamas battalions in the northern Gaza Strip. CTP-ISW has warned that the third phase of Israeli operations in the Gaza Strip, as described, will very likely enable Hamas to reconstitute itself militarily.

• The Israeli Defense Forces reported that it uncovered evidence of Iran training Hamas in constructing precision munitions in the Gaza Strip.

• The Nahal Brigade Combat Team located a Palestinian compound with dozens of rocket launchers in Beit Lahia.

• The Golani Brigade continued conducting clearing operations in Maghazi and Bureij in the Central Governorate of the Gaza Strip.

• The Kfir Brigade continued conducting clearing operations in Khan Younis.

• Former IDF Military Intelligence Directorate chief Amos Yadlin reported that the IDF knows where Hamas leader in the Gaza Strip Yahya Sinwar is located but that he has surrounded himself with many of the remaining hostages, which complicates Israeli targeting.

• The al Quds Brigades fired five rocket salvos from the Gaza Strip into southern Israel.

• Israeli forces clashed with Palestinian fighters ten times across the West Bank.

• Iranian-backed fighters, including Lebanese Hezbollah, conducted 14 attacks from southern Lebanon into northern Israel.

• The Islamic Resistance in Iraq—a coalition of Iranian-backed Iraqi militias—claimed that it conducted a long-range cruise missile attack targeting Haifa. The Islamic Resistance in Iraq also conducted two one-way drone attacks on US positions in Iraq and Syria.

• Unspecified actors conducted an airstrike targeting an Iranian-backed militia convoy reportedly transferring military equipment in Albu Kumal, Syria. Israel has conducted an air campaign in Syria in recent months meant to disrupt Iranian military transfers into the Levant.

• The Jordanian armed forces reported that they eliminated five Iranian-backed militia members attempting to smuggle drugs and weapons into Jordan from southern Syria.

• IRGC Quds Force officer Brigadier General Eraj Masjedi stated that the Palestinian militias will eventually obtain unspecified “defensive weapons” that would prevent Israel from conducting airstrikes into the Gaza Strip.