JERUSALEM (VINnews) — The IDF is racing to finish eliminating Hezbollah terror infrastructure in 52 southern Lebanese villages in the coming weeks before the US presses Israel for a wider withdrawal, IDF sources told the Jerusalem Post on Wednesday.

During a visit by Israeli military reporters to Bint Jbail, multiple kilometers into southern Lebanon, and where the IDF vanquished one of Hezbollah’s main centers of gravity in the area, IDF officials how they defeated the group and the current state of affairs.

On Tuesday, US President Donald Trump told Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that he wanted Israel to withdraw from both Lebanon and Syria. Yet in order to withdraw, Israel must first find an able partner to occupy areas where it withdraws from and also be able to supervise the partner’s activities in curbing terrorist elements from approaching Israel’s borders. In order to achieve this, the IDF is building a series of permanent outposts in Southern Lebanon, despite the US demands for a unilateral withdrawal. These outposts will enable it to monitor the entire region of Southern Lebanon and identify security risks in the region.

For the last couple of weeks, Israel, the US, and Lebanon have been negotiating over the regions where the pilot program of Israel undertaking small partial withdrawals, in which it hands over a specific area to the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF), will take place.

Originally, two areas under discussion were Tibnin and Ali Taher Ridge, but there could be an evolution in the areas, including the addition of a third area, IDF sources said.

On July 5, the Post spoke with the Givati Brigade’s Weapons Commander Lt.-Col. “I,” who described watching the LAF move into certain areas where the Givati Brigade was leaving.

According to “I”, higher-level IDF and US officials handled the transition and handover of territory coordination, with “I” and his forces observing the Lebanese army from a safe distance for a period of minutes. Curiously, this handover of land occurred some weeks before the IDF had said that officially transferring territory in some key spots in southern Lebanon over to the Lebanese army would occur.

IDF sources emphasized that it is critical to Israel that the transfer process ensures the LAF meets certain benchmarks before additional transfers proceed.

The IDF has said that after the previous withdrawal in November 2024, after a few months of trying more seriously to evict Hezbollah from southern Lebanon, the weaker Lebanese army eventually mostly gave up, part of why Hezbollah started to recover and felt strong enough to attack Israel again in 2026.

The partial withdrawals and land transfers are being coordinated by US Marine Corps Lt.-Gen. Joseph R. Clearfield, who was the main coordinator with Israel and Lebanon on such issues from fall 2024 until the recent war, with support from around 30 other American military officials.

IDF sources said that Clearfield properly understands the weaknesses that the Lebanese army has, though they cannot vouch for whether American political officials will hold up the land transfers if necessary from an Israeli security perspective, which may clash with their timeline for wrapping up Lebanon as an issue.

An official for CENTCOM’s Marine Corps Command (MARCENT), relating to CENTCOM’s Military Coordination Group for Lebanon, declined over the weekend to provide more specific updates about how the transfer of territory was going so far. However, the Post reported that Clearfield met with IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Eyal Zamir on July 1 and secretly visited Lebanon on July 2.

While IDF sources are concerned that the Lebanese army will again fail at clearing Hezbollah from areas it takes over, as it failed in 2024-2025, they have some additional hope of success given that this time the Lebanese government has held several public meetings with Israel and is publicly backing disarming Hezbollah.