Israel-Hamas War - What happened on day 66?

Many of the Hamas terrorists surrendering to the IDF were involved in the October 7 massacre, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant stated on Monday evening during a televised address. 

"Hamas is on the verge of dissolution, the IDF is taking over its last strongholds," Gallant said.

He added that Israel has no intention to maintain a permanent presence in the Gaza Strip. 

News of the Mossad’s success in helping Cyprus thwart a plot by Iran to kill Israelis and Jews is in some ways a small footnote to a much larger story.

Last week, the National Security Council put out an unprecedented warning to Israelis traveling to over 80 countries, including European countries normally thought of as quite safe.

"The difference between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority is only that Hamas wants to destroy us here and now and the PA wants to do it in stages," Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said during a discussion in Monday's Foreign Affairs and Security Committee meeting.

Netanyahu declined to comment on the current situation in the north where Israel and Lebanese groups such as Hezbollah have been trading blows since the start of the war.

The prime minister also said that he had no timeline regarding when the Israelis displaced by the war in those areas would be able to return to their homes.

UN Security Council envoys spoke of unimaginable suffering and urged an end to the war in the Gaza Strip on Monday as they headed across Egypt's Sinai Peninsula to the Rafah crossing, the besieged Palestinian enclave's only entry point for aid.

China's representative to the United Nations Zhang Jun, asked by reporters if he had a message to nations which opposed a ceasefire in Gaza, said simply: "Enough is enough."

The mayor of the south Lebanese village of Taybeh was killed by an Israeli strike on Monday, the Lebanese state news agency reported.

Soldiers of the IDF’s Nahal Brigade discovered an RPG training facility inside a mosque in Jabalya, in northern Gaza, the IDF said on Monday.

Weapons found in Jabalya, Gaza. Some of them were found in UNRWA bags. (credit: IDF SPOKESPERSON'S UNIT)

The IDF personnel also found various weapons, grenades, and cartridges at the site, some of which were reportedly being stored inside bags belonging to humanitarian organizations.

IDF combat soldiers thwarted an attempted Hamas ambush on their position in the Gaza Strip and destroyed a tunnel shaft, the IDF Spokesperson's Unit revealed Monday.

The IDF troops, part of the Jerusalem Brigade, had received intelligence in advance warning them of the Hamas attack on their position.

The Lebanese terrorist organization Hezbollah announced two more casualties from recent Israel Air Force attacks, bringing the total death toll to 100 since the start of Operation Swords of Iron.

However, the terrorist group excludes 20 Palestinian terrorist casualties, even though they operated under the group's direct protection in the ongoing campaign.

IDF Northern Command chief Maj.-Gen. Uri Gordin is spearheading a new approach to targeting terrorist compounds that serve as launch points for Hezbollah attacks on Israel. Through meticulous intelligence gathering, the IDF identifies these areas and systematically launches accurate attacks on the infrastructure that the Shi'ite terrorist organization has built over the years. 

Notably, two specific locations, Kunin and Aita al-Shayib, situated about a kilometer north of the Lebanese border near Shtula, were targeted based on intelligence from the Intelligence Division and Northern Command.