The combat engineering battalion 603 is blowing up “endless” amounts of Hezbollah’s terror infrastructure in southern Lebanon, Lt. Col. “R,” the battalion commander, told The Jerusalem Post in a recent interview.
R said that his unit has found and destroyed over 1,000 terror infrastructure sites during almost five weeks of service in southern Lebanon.
Originally from Ramat Gan, R is 37 and married with two children. He has served in the IDF for 19 years, including as the combat engineering officer for Division 162 and for the special forces Yahalom unit.
R has been in his current role for around 10 months and expects to continue for another one to two years before moving to any new roles.
The 603rd Combat Engineering Battalion is part of the 7th Brigade and finished a period of combat in central Gaza around six weeks ago.
This followed three months of combat in the Rafah area of Gaza, near the Yellow Line, during which R’s brigade killed 24 Hamas terrorists in a combination of close-up fighting and tank attacks.
His fighters were in a period of refreshing their skills and their training at their home base north of Eilat. One week later, this training was interrupted by a call to mobilize to the border with Lebanon.
Fighting in Lebanon different from Gaza combat, R says
After an additional week of collecting all the equipment and heavy vehicles needed for their operations, as well as servicing those vehicles so they would be fully ready, the battalion entered service in Lebanon around March 10.
R said that “the massive changes in the topography in Lebanon after having spent over a year serving in Gaza were significant.”
He added, “We were experts in Gaza topography. We knew the land, and the land is a key piece,” of combat engineering. We knew how to achieve great results, destroying tunnels, and cornering or killing Hamas terrorists.
“Now, we needed to learn the new topography [in Lebanon],” he said.
During the first week of operations in Lebanon, he said, they developed their strategic and tactical plans for battle. Part of Division 36’s operation in Lebanon, the division’s soldiers, including Battalion 603, penetrated deeper into Lebanon than some of the other five divisions that eventually joined the fight.
It has been standard in both Gaza and Lebanon for various IDF combat engineer forces, as well as the special forces Yahalom unit, to use drones, robots, and other hi-tech items to facilitate taking over and dominating new battle space areas, along with the regular infantry and tanks that they accompany.
During their service in Lebanon, “We destroyed lots of terror infrastructure, but at first, there were no terrorists. We were very surprised,” R said.
“We destroyed around 1,000 terror infrastructure sites, many of which were civilian houses that Hezbollah had essentially turned into their weapons depots,” he explained.
Despite the IDF’s fall 2024 invasion in which five divisions worked for several months to clear the first line of southern Lebanese villages of Hezbollah weapons, R emphasized, “Even in the first villages’ battle line there were lots of Hezbollah weapons.” This included areas close to the border fence.
“We thought we would see less,” he said, “but the weapons were endless. There were also tunnels, military lookout positions, ammunition, heavy weapons and rockets, and Hezbollah uniforms.”
Everyone knew that there would be “lots of weapons at the second and third villages’ battle lines,” since the IDF was not as focused on clearing them in the fall of 2024 through February 2025
“We exploded these items very systematically. We made sure not to miss any of the houses that held Hezbollah weapons, even if they were off to the side,” he noted. “Hezbollah also hid weapons, rockets, and improvised explosives in many forests. We got rid of all of it.”
If Hezbollah tries to return to its positions, “they will be very beat up,” R assured.
Hezbollah spent years building up infrastructure
Hezbollah spent years building its weapons storage network and a series of positions, including communications networks and above-and-below-ground connected military apparatuses.
R estimated that possibly between 25 percent and 50% of the weapons, along with Hezbollah’s network in the area, have now been cleared.
But to fully clear these threats, he said, the IDF would need at a minimum a period of additional months.
Addressing the problem was a dilemma of legitimacy, R explained. If Israel achieves more global legitimacy, then, if the IDF gives him the time, his and other military units have a plan for continuing to work to clear these items over a period of months.
Addressing the difference between challenges in Gaza and Lebanon, R said, “There are lots of challenges in maneuvering tanks and infantry through problematic topography, from swampy land to challenging wet and sticky sand terrain. This is true with or without a direct challenge from the enemy at any given point.”
“When the geological challenges are larger, the vehicles needed to help free a stuck vehicle are larger,” he said.
Besides blowing up Hezbollah and Hamas terror infrastructure and helping salvage vehicles that get stuck, R’s unit is also critical in paving new roads and paths or widening old ones so that infantry and tanks can maneuver during invasions.
When other unpredictable issues surface, which require creativity to help Brigade 7 carry out its mission, R and Battalion 603 must figure out solutions.
Now, his troops will finally have a longer period of refreshing their skills out of the field and back on base, before heading back into the field in Gaza.
“The nation of Israel is very strong,” R concluded. “Our soldiers are very happy to be in the field – to defend Israel. They are not sad and do not have mixed feelings.
“All of our weapons and vehicles would be worthless without these great and brave soldiers. We heard a lot about Hezbollah, but our fighters were not afraid.”
Whether it is protecting Shlomi, Misgav Am, or Kiryat Shmona from attack, he said his unit wants to give Israeli civilians a “clean” basis for living, meaning without the threat of Hezbollah hovering over them.