It was reported that the IDF Brigade commander for Unit 769 issued evacuation orders on Sunday for that small village of typically a few hundred residents.
IDF sources said that the commander had acted on his own and was being investigated.
Further, the sources said that the evacuation orders were not distributed throughout the village or anywhere beyond the village, but only to a certain area of tents where Syrian refugees have taken up residence.
Pressed about whether the purpose of the evacuation order was to save the refugees from setting up their lives in a dangerous zone where the IDF and Hezbollah have been fighting or whether it was to deter potential troublemaking militias from thinking they could set up a new threatening position against Israel under the guise of being refugees, IDF sources were not yet entirely sure.
Tensions in northern Israel
IDF sources were especially unclear because the Brigade Commander had acted without authorization from the IDF Northern Command, the IDF high command, or the cabinet.
It was unclear why the brigade commander believed he had this authority, or alternatively, if he had quietly received an unofficial green light from some higher up authority, who then later denied knowledge and involvement.
Israel has also been searching for a way to raise the level of its retaliations against Hezbollah to deter the terror group from continuing to fight in the North.
Earlier on Sunday, Lebanese reports had said that the IDF leaflets were calling on Sunday morning for the evacuation of the Wazzani village in southern Lebanon by 4 p.m. local time.
The IDF made minor announcements about limited fighting with Hamas in Gaza, but there has been only very low level fighting since Defense Minister Yoav Gallant declared Hamas’s final battalion in Rafah beaten on August 21.