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Source: https://www.ynetnews.com/magazine/article/hjvzjlzfze
IDF Commander on Capturing the Beaufort Fortress in Lebanon
(Ynet News) Raanan Shaked - Lt.-Col. Bar Vackert, commander of the Golani Brigade reconnaissance battalion, led the IDF's return to the Beaufort fortress. He says, "As we were fighting in the villages of southern Lebanon, they fired anti-tank missiles and indirect fire at us from the direction of Beaufort....They are constantly shooting from there. So you want to get there." "We found an underground system there, a very large tunnel network, hundreds of meters long, with levels, ladders and rooms. From there, they fired and launched attacks on Israel, and that underground system alone justified getting there....The Beaufort ridge is a key terrain area with very great operational importance. It looks 360 degrees over the entire Nabatieh plateau on one side, and toward Metula and Israel on the other. You sit there and you control." Q: Were soldiers afraid? Vackert: "No. Every time I am surprised again that before these attacks, I have thoughts, concerns, and then I see the team commanders and the soldiers, and they have no concerns at all. They go out to attack, run, leap forward, shoot without fear. It is amazing to see. They have such a passion to complete the mission that they are completely locked in. Nothing else interests them." "In every village in southern Lebanon we reached, small or large, we always found weapons and explosives inside homes, inside children's rooms. It is unbelievable in an extreme way. There was not a single village where we did not find terror infrastructure and positions....The other side needs to understand that the price of firing at [Israeli] residents is very heavy, and that it will only keep losing more and more."