Battle of Ayta ash-Shab

Battle of Ayta ash-Sha'b Part of 2006 Lebanon War Ayta ash-Sha'b and surroundings Date July 12, 2006 – August 14, 2006 Location Ayta ash-Sha'b, Southern Lebanon Result Israel failed to conquer the town Belligerents Israel Defense Forces Hezbollah Commanders and leaders Lieutenant General Udi Adam Brigadier General Gal Hirsch Colonel Ilan Atias Strength 188th Armored Brigade Paratroopers Brigade About 100 soldiers, mainly local militia Casualties and losses 28 killed 11 killed 2 captured 7 Lebanese civilians killed

The Battle of Ayta ash-Sha'b took place during the 2006 Lebanon War, when the Israel Defense Forces and the Islamic Resistance, the armed wing of Hezbollah, fought a 33 days battle for the town of Ayta ash-Sha'b and the neighboring villages of Ramiya, al-Qawzah and Dibil in southern Lebanon. The initial phase of the battle consisted of two and a half weeks of intense bombardment by air and artillery, followed by more than two weeks of intensive fighting in and around the town. The IDF failed to capture the town and suffered heavy casualties in the process.

Background

On July 12, 2006, under the cover of mortar and rocket fire directed at Israeli communities and IDF positions , forces belonging to the Islamic Resistance launched a cross border raid into Israeli territory, killing three Israeli soldiers and abducting two, Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev. The abductors apparently headed for the town of Ayta ash-Sha'b, less than a kilometer from the site of the abduction.

Nir Rosen writes that Ayta ash-Sha'b was defended by approximately 100 fighters, mainly local inhabitants. Some of the defenders of the town were not members of the Islamic Resistanse or even of Hezbollah. According to Andrew Exum, the majority of the fighters were not "regular Hizballah fighters". The great majority of the fighters fought in uniforms similar to those of the Lebanese army. Blanford agrees that most the fighters were local residents, but that they were "no second-rate home guard. They were battle-hardened veterans,… many of them with specialist training in anti-armor missiles and sniping." According to a study supported by Israeli authorities, Hezbollah’s military infrastructure in the village consisted of 60-70 Hezbollah operatives.

The battle

Ayta ash-Sha'b and other Lebanese border villages and Hezbollah outposts were immediately subjected to bombardment from aircraft and artillery, plus attack helicopters supporting Israeli ground forces. This would continue almost daily throughout the war. On the first day the IDF declared, somewhat optimistically, that "all Hezbollah outposts along the border were destroyed."

Less than two hours after the capture of the two soldiers, the IDF sent a force of tanks and armored personnel carriers across the border following a dirt track, through an olive grove called Khillat Warda, leading to Ayta ash-Sha'b. The force was ordered to capture a Hezbollah post and to take control of the exit roads from the town, in case the abducted soldiers were still there. Only 70 meters into Lebanese territory, a Merkava heavy battle tank drove over a remote-controlled mine. The tank was destroyed and its four crewmen were killed instantly, and the mission to capture the access roads to the town was quickly abandoned. Hezbollah fire prevented the extraction of the destroyed tank and the remains of the four soldiers just inside Lebanese territory for several days. A fifth soldier was killed and two soldiers wounded in the effort. Defence Minister Amir Peretz was stunned. It was later described as the "Zidane effect" that cemented Israel's resolve towards going to war.

On the evening of July 12, IDF Northern Command contemplated sending paratroopers to Ayta ash-Sha'b "to conduct arrests". This was postponed because of a lack of intelligence, but during the first week fighting was limited to exchanges of fire over the border. The original plan deemed it unnecessary to occupy Lebanese territory to rid the border of Hezbollah. Israel used the air force, both aircraft and attack helicopters, and artillery fire. The Lebanese fighters fired rockets, guided missiles, mortars, Katyusha rockets and heavy machine guns at Israeli towns and positions. According to Yedioth Ahronoth more than 300 rockets were fired from the area during the war. The headquarters of the 91st Division at Biranit just across the border from Ayta ash-Sha'b was subjected to a "hard and extremely accurate" attack by Katyusha rockets. The Command bunker received a direct hit destroying the generator and cutting off light and air supply to the facility. According to Islamic Resistance commanders the fighters suffered no casualties during this period.

On July 14 the civilian inhabitants of the town were warned through loudspeakers to evacuate the town. The great majority of the population therefore left. About a week into the war the IDF resumed ground operations around Ayta ash-Sha'b, with nightly incursions by foot, mainly around the Old Quarter in the west and the northern sections of the town, such as the Abu Tawil hill. These incursions were described by Arkin as "probes" and probably served mainly to gather intelligence. On the 19th, Northern Command launched a simultaneous attack on the border communities of Maroun ar-Ras, Marwahin and Ayta ash-Sha'b. The attack on Maroun ar-Ras failed, sustaining a number of casualties, and the forces about to attack Ayta ash-Sha'b were called back at the last moment.

Two weeks into the war it was clear that the Israeli strategy was not working. In late July the Israeli cabinet therefore approved Operation Change of Direction 8 (originally "Operation Web of Steel 4"), designed to take control of a "security zone", 6-8 kilometers wide, along the border. Reserves were called up and eight brigades amassed on the Israeli-Lebanese border.

On July 31 paratroopers effectively surrounded Ayta ash-Sha'b with the intention of driving out the Hezbollah. They were met with fierce resistance. On the next day they advanced on the town from two directions. One company-sized unit was advancing into the eastern Abu Laban quarter. The troops were discovered by Lebanese forces, which after several hours of fighting forced the Israelis to retreat. During this fight Hezbollah suffered its first fatality, Younis Surour. The other force, the 890th Paratrooper Battalion, attacked the Old Town from the north and advanced towards the mosque. The battalion came under fire, and its forces got separated as they took cover. Israeli soldiers were shocked by the ferocity of the fire and several stopped functioning. The attack was aborted and reinforcements were called in to extract dead, wounded and shell-shocked soldiers. According to Hezbollah, another Lebanese fighter, Hisham as-Sayyid, was killed while pursuing the retreating Israelis. Three Israeli soldiers, including an officer, were killed and at least 25 were wounded. The IDF had claimed that 15 Hezbollah guerrillas had been killed in the clash, though the Hezbollah admitted only two fatalities. Israeli injured had to be carried by their comrades, under Hezbollah fire, back to the Israeli border. It took the wounded a whole day to reach the hospital in Nahariya. The Paratroopers were originally supposed to move north the following day but because of the heavy casualties were ordered to remain in the vicinity of the town.

Defense Minister Amir Peretz expressed his growing frustration at the slow progress IDF was making to his senior officers: "It's infuriating - we're circling Ayta al-Shaab for the third time already."

On August 2, "harsh battles" were reported inside the town. One Israeli paratrooper was reported killed and nine wounded. On the same day, an Israeli force surrounded a house in the northern Abu Tawil section of the town. When the house was searched two Hezbollah fighters hiding in the house were discovered and taken prisoner.

Israeli media reports were still upbeat and reported that the IDF during the day was "set to complete its deployment" in a 5-6 kilometers wide "security zone" along the Lebanese border, all the way between Metula and Rosh Hanikra. Ayta ash-Sha'b, less than a kilometer from the border, was going to prove a much more difficult nut to crack than expected.

The Islamic Resistance fighters generally fought from well-protected positions. A Resistance fighter told Lebanese daily as-Safir after the war how close the Israeli and Lebanese soldiers were, sometimes separated only by an alley or a destroyed house. The first time he saw Israeli soldiers he could not believe his eyes: "They were so close that sometimes our units would overlap theirs". The Israeli soldiers would advance into a neighborhood and seek cover in a building when exposed to fire. The fighters would then target the building with remote-controlled missiles or rocket-propelled grenades. Most of the casualties sustained by the IDF were caused by rockets or missiles. When Israeli forces retreated the fighters would generally take cover in tunnels or shelters to avoid the shelling or bombardment from the air that would usually follow. When the shelling stopped the fighters would emerge to face the expected Israeli advance. Sometimes the fighters were not so lucky. Hisham Murtada and two other (unnamed) resistance fighters "from outside Ayta" had taken cover in a shelter during a violent air raid. The shelter received a direct hit and collapsed, killing all three. Their bodies could not be retrieved until 10 days later. Another Hezbollah fighter, Hasan Da'iq, was killed by a drone strike, one of the first Lebanese to do so.

In spite of the substantial losses, IDF officials denied that there was any intention of withdrawing from the village, without "a clear surrender" of Hezbollah, because it was major stronghold and considered a "symbol of the determination" of the movement. One soldier was killed and at least 19 were wounded in further heavy clashes in Ayta ash-Sha'b on August 5. The losses precipitated a much criticized withdrawal of the reserve brigade from the village.

On August 6, the Defence Minister again expressed his dissatisfaction over the army’s inability to conquer Ayta ash-Sha'b. The orders to the IDF to quickly occupy Ayta ash-Sha'b were repeated several times over the coming days. A negotiating team that had been sent to the town to negotiate a peaceful surrender of its defenders returned empty handed on August 7.

Israeli forces eventually bypassed Ayta ash-Sha'b and started pushing northward towards the villages of al-Qawzah and Dibil, a few kilometers to the north of the town. Both of the villages were Christian and Hezbollah probably maintained a minimal presence there. The front line was thereby "extended from ash-Shomera-Zar’it [in Israel], over Khillat Warda [near the border] and reaching al-Qawzah and Dibil”. A heavy PUMA APC was hit by a missile in the village of Dibil on August 7, killing one soldier and injuring five others.

August 9 a large IDF force was discovered by Islamic Resistance scouts while advancing from al-Qawzah towards Dibil. Local headquarters were alerted and the Israeli force was subjected to artillery and mortar fire, near the Dibil public swimming pool, from positions outside Ayta ash-Sha'b. Hezbollah did not maintain artillery inside the town. An Israeli unit, belonging to the 8219th Engineering Battalion, took up positions in a house on the outskirts of Dibil. The house was hit by two anti-tank missiles fired from Ayta ash-Sha'b (about 4 kilometers away) and the building collapsed. Nine soldiers were killed and 31 wounded, many of whom were buried under the ruins. Among those killed were Major Natan Yahav, the only senior IDF officer to die in the battle of Ayta ash-Sha'b. The incident was dubbed "The House of Death". Survivors later expressed bitterness at the IDF command, whose "incompetence and stupidity" contributed to the high number of casualties. "In Debel, those nine guys never even had a chance to shoot a single bullet." The casualties had to be carried on stretchers back to Israel.

The same day, a Merkava tank was hit by a missile, fired from close range in Ayta ash-Sha'b. The tank turret was blown off and the tank caught fire. Its four crewmen were killed instantly.

On the same day, General Eisenkott had to inform the government that the army had failed to capture Ayta ash-Sha'b. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert demanded an explanation.

Less than three days before the ceasefire Operation Changing Direction 11 was launched with the aim of pushing further into Lebanese territory. About a dozen Israeli soldiers died in the fighting around the villages of Hadatha, Yatar, at-Tiri, Rashaf and Ayta az-Zut, well to the north of Ayta ash-Sha'b. There are no reports of any offensive Israeli action against Hezbollah positions in the town itself. On the last day of the fighting, another disaster struck IDF when a force stationed at the Abu Tawil hill in the northern part of the town was hit by an anti-tank missile. Four soldiers were killed and 20 wounded.

By the time the cease-fire took effect on the morning of August 14 the IDF apparently had abandoned all its positions inside Ayta a-Sha'b. Blanford notes: "On the first day of the ceasefire, it was possible to reach [Aita ash-Sha'b]… which lay behind the IDF’s frontline positions in Haddatha, Rashaf and Yatar without even seeing a single IDF soldier." A camera team from al-Jazeera reached the village and interviewed a resistance fighter a few hours after the ceasefire took effect.

Aftermath

The Israeli army never succeeded in capturing Ayta ash-Sha'b. According to Harel and Issacharoff, the town became "a symbol of Israel's performance in the war, the village where it all began, where the IDF thrashed about for four weeks and never succeeded in taking." Exum described Hezbollah's "tenacity" in the defense of the border villages as "the biggest surprise of the war" and the performance of the village units as "exceptional". The IDF admitted 28 killed (of which five were officers) in 33 days of fighting in and around the town (including five at the border on the 12th of July, thirteen inside the town and ten in the nearby village of Dibil). According to Lebanese sources eleven Islamic Resistance fighters were killed in the battle, of which eight or nine were local residents, and one was a local commander. Another two Hezbollah fighters were taken prisoners.

The Carmeli Brigade pulled a battalion out of the town, after one of its soldiers was killed, in what was described as a "tactical retreat". The performance of the Carmeli Brigade was afterwards singled out (together with another unit, the 366th Division) for particular harsh criticism. It displayed a "lack of determination, an unnecessary retreat and a misunderstanding of the bigger picture. Much of the blame was placed on the top brass, but the [two] brigades were left thoroughly shaken by the war." After the war a committee, headed by Col. (res) Yoram Yair, sharply criticized the conduct of 91st Division during the war, including the battle of Ayta ash-Sha'b. The battle was called "the black hole of the war". Brig.-Gen. Gal Hirsch, the commanding officer under which the Carmeli Brigade served during the war, was fired a few months after the war.

The commander of the Northern Command, Gen. Udi Adam, was practically fired already on Aug. 8, after the repeated failures to capture Bint Jbeil and Ayta ash-Sha'b. Chief of Staff Halutz sent his deputy, Maj.-Gen. Moshe Kaplinski, to Northern Command, to serve as his "coordinator" beside Adam. Adam formally resigned from the army in September. Chief of Staff Dan Halutz himself resigned in January 2007.

Veteran Israeli war correspondent Ron Ben-Yishai claimed that the problem was not limited to the commanding officers. He claimed that a "crybaby culture" had developed among the soldiers of the Israeli army. Almost every Israeli offensive operation in the war, including those in Ayta ash-Sha'b, were called off as soon as resistance was encountered, even though IDF in almost every clash enjoyed superiority, both in terms of numbers and firepower. Soldiers often took cover and abandoned their missions as soon as they came under attack. All efforts were thereafter focused on evacuating casualties from the battlefield.

Gilad Sharon asked in a column in Yedioth Ahronoth after the war: "How could it be that after a month of war, our soldiers were still being wounded among the still-standing houses of the village of Aita al-Shaab, literately hundreds of meters from the location of the abduction that sparked the war?"

Casualties

Journalist Simon Assaf who visited Ayta ash-Sha'b shortly after the cease-fire says that eight local fighters were killed and six civilians, claiming to have seen the 14 graves at the local cemetery. Nir Rosen,who arrived somewhat later, claims that nine local fighters died in the battle. The Lebanese daily as-Safir about a year later published the names of the eleven "resistance martyrs" who died in the battle of Ayta ash-Sha'b, including non-locals and the seven "civilian martyrs" from the town. Another Ayta resident, Muhammad Wahbi Surour, was also named as a martyr of Ayta but he died in the fighting around the village of Bareesh further to the north. One of those named by as-Safir, Hassan Da’iq, also appear on a list of martyrs from the town of Tayiba published on the local website. The local website identifies him as a native of Tayiba who was killed in the "battles of Ayta ash-Sha'b". His name was given as Muhammad Mahmoud Da’iq, adding that his "nom-du-guerre" was Hassan.

The IDF claims that 40 Hezbollah guerrillas were killed in the battle. The Israeli daily Yedioth Ahronoth estimated that ten local fighters were killed, in addition to an unspecified number fighters from outside the town. According to the Yedioth Achronoth "Encyclopedia" of the Second Lebanon War, Lebanese sources put the number of Hezbollah fatalities during the war to 300 while Israeli sources claim that 700 were killed. This difference was, according to Yedioth Achronoth, mainly explained by the distinction made by the Lebanese between "combatant" and "civilian" members of Hezbollah. . On August 6 Haaretz reported the IDF placing the number of Hezbollah fighters killed at 400, but added that "armies fighting guerrilla forces tend to exaggerate the fatalities of the enemy."

Two Hezbollah fighters were taken prisoner by the IDF during the battle of Ayta ash-Sha'b. The IDF did not manage to capture a large number of Hizbullah fighters, and at the end of the war Israel had only four and the bodies of ten more in its hands. Harel and Issacharoff write: "The large prisoner-of-war camps that the IDF had prepared in the Galilee remained unoccupied. Almost no Hezbollah guerilla surrendered. The few who were taken prisoner usually had been surprised at home while sleeping."

The captured Hezbollah fighters were not recognized as prisoners-of-war. In September 2006 the two prisoners were put on trial, together with a third prisoner, Mahir Kourani, who was captured a few days later at the village of Shihin. The three were accused of a long series of criminal offenses, including "providing service to an illegal association," "weapons training in Iran and Lebanon without government permission," "conspiracy to commit a crime," and "conspiracy to commit murder" as well as participation in the kidnapping and attempted kidnapping of Israeli soldiers. Before the trial was concluded the three prisoners (including the fourth prisoner, Khadr Zaidan, who was captured at Ghandouriya) were released in the 2008 prisoner exchange.

In spite of the wide spread destruction in Ayta ash-Sha'b there were surprisingly few civilian casualties. According to Lebanese sources only seven civilian residents were killed in the war. The main reason for this seems to have been that the great majority of the civilian population had been evacuated from the town early in the conflict. According to a Human Rights Watch report two of the civilian fatalities were actually killed outside the town. On the 19th of July Safa Salah Jawad, aged 7, and her brother Kawthar, 4, were killed when an 155 mm artillery shell struck the private home in the nearby Christian village of Rumaysh, where the family had sought refuge after being evacuated from Ayta ash-Sha'b. Most of the other civilian fatalities seems to have occurred before the ground war started. One man was killed July 20 by an missile fired by a helicopter. An elderly couple and their son in his forties were killed the day after when their home was destroyed by an air strike.

Lebanese Islamic Resistance fatalities

• Hassan Da’iq (resident of Tayiba)
• Ali Abdal-Hasan Khalil
• Shadi Hani Mas’ad
• Hasan Muhsin
• Hisham Muhsin Murtada
• Muhammad Kamal Surour
• Muhammad Mousa Surour
• Younis Ya’qoub Surour
• Yousuf Muhammad as-Sayyid
• Muhammad Rida Tuhaini
• Wajeeh Muhammad Tuhaini

Lebanese prisoners-of-war

• Muhammad Surour
• Hussein Suleiman (captured in Ayta but a resident of Beirut)

Lebanese civilian fatalities

• Rida Rida
• Haniya Surour
• Ahmad Rida
• Ahmad Abdan-Nabi
• Ali Hassan Daqdouq
• Kawthar Salah Jawad (killed in Rumaysh)
• Safa Salah Jawad (killed in Rumaysh)

Israeli fatalities

July 12, 2006

• Staff-Sergeant Alexei Kushnirski, 21, of Ness Ziona
• Staff-Sergeant Yaniv Bar-on, 20, of Maccabim
• Sergeant Gadi Mosayev, 20, of Akko
• Sergeant Shlomi Yirmiyahu, 20, of Rishon LeZion
• Sergeant Nimrod Cohen, 19, of Mitzpe Shalem

Aug 1, 2006

• Lieutenant Ilan Gabai, 21, of Kiryat Tivon
• Staff-Sergeant Yonatan Einhorn (Paratroopers), 22, of Moshav Gimzo
• Staff-Sergeant Michael Levin, 21, of Jerusalem

Aug 2, 2006

• Sergeant Adi Cohen, 18, of Hadera

Aug 5, 2006

• Corporal (res.) Kiril Kashdan (Carmeli brigade), 26, of Haifa

Aug 7, 2006

• Staff-Sergeant Philip Mosko, 21 (killed in Dibil)

Aug 9, 2006

• Captain (res.) Gilad Stukelman, 26, of Moshav Timrat
• Sergeant-Major.(res.) Noam Goldman, 27, of Tel Aviv
• Staff-Sergeant (res.) Nir Cohen, 22, of Maccabim
• Staff-Sergeant (res.) Ben (Binyamin) Sela, 24, of Koranit
• Major (res.) Natan Yahav, 36, of Kiryat Ono (killed in Dibil)
• Captain (res.) Yoni (Leon) Shmucher, 30, of Bet Nehemia (killed in Dibil)
• Sergeant-Major (res.) Asher Reuven Novik, 36, of Kanaf (killed in Dibil)
• Staff-Sergeant Adi Salim, 22, of Beit Hashmonai (killed in Dibil)
• Sergeant-Major (res.) Elad Dan, 25, of Kibbutz Eilot (killed in Dibil)
• Sergeant-Major (res.) Gilad Zussman, 26, of Eli (killed in Dibil)
• Sergeant-Major (res.) Idan Kobi, 26, of Eilat (killed in Dibil)
• Sergeant-Major (res.) Naor Kalo, 25, of Kibbutz Maagan Michael (killed in Dibil)
• Sergeant-Major (res.) Nimrod Segev, 28, of Ramat Gan (killed in Dibil)

Aug 13, 2006

• Lieutenant (res.) Eliel Ben-Yehuda (Carmeli brigade), 24, of Kfar Tavor
• Sergeant-Major (res.) Guy Hasson (Carmeli brigade), 24, of Moshav Na'omi
• Staff-Sergeant (res.) Yaniv Shainbrum (Carmeli brigade), 24, of Mei Ami
• Staff-Sergeant (res.) Elad Shlomo Ram (Carmeli brigade), 31, of Haifa

External links

• Aljazeera Exclusive Interview with a Hezbollah Fighter on YouTube
• Hezbollah terrorist interviewed by Israeli Official on YouTube

Bibliography

• Arkin, William M. (July 2007). "Divining Victory: Airpower in the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah War". Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama: Air University Press. http://aupress.maxwell.af.mil/Books/Arkin/arkin.pdf. 

• Biddle, Stephen and Jeffrey A. Friedman, "THE 2006 LEBANON CAMPAIGN AND THE FUTURE OF WARFARE: IMPLICATIONS FOR ARMY AND DEFENSE POLICY", Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College, September 2008

• Blanford, Nicholas, "HIZBULLAH AND THE IDF: ACCEPTING NEW REALITIES ALONG THE BLUE LINE" in THE SIXTH WAR ISRAEL’S INVASION OF LEBANON, The MIT Electronic Journal of Middle East Studies Vol. 6, Summer 2006

• Crooke, Alastair and Mark Perry, HOW HEZBOLLAH DEFEATED ISRAEL, Asia Times

PART 1: Winning the intelligence war, Oct 12, 2006

PART 2: Winning the ground war, Oct 13, 2006

PART 3: The political war, Oct 14, 2006

• Erlich, Dr. Reuven (Col. Ret.) (November 2006). "Hezbollah's use of Lebanese civilians as human shields". Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center at the Center for Special Studies (C.S.S). http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/malam_multimedia/English/eng_n/html/human_shields.htm. Retrieved February 4, 2102.  [The study was supported by Military Intelligence, the Operations Division of the IDF General Staff, the IDF Spokesperson and the legal experts of the IDF and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.]

• Exum, Andrew, "Hizballah at War - A Military Assessment", Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Policy Focus #63 | December 2006

• Harel, Amos; Issacharoff, Avi (2008). 34 Days: Israel, Hezbollah, and the War in Lebanon. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. 

• Human Rights Watch (HRW), "Why They Died", Civilian Casualties in Lebanon during the 2006 War, September 2007

• Human Rights Watch (HRW), "Flooding South Lebanon", Israel’s Use of Cluster Munitions in Lebanon in July and August 2006, February 2008

• Matthews, Matt M., "We Were Caught Unprepared: The 2006 Hezbollah-Israeli War", The Long War Series Occasional Paper 26, U.S. Army Combined Arms Center Combat Studies Institute Press Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, 2006

• Rapaport, Amir, אש על כוחותינו: כך הכשלנו את עצמנו במלחמת לבנון השנייה (Firendly Fire, How We Failed Ourselves in the Second Lebanon War), Sifriya Ma'ariv, 2007

• Shelah, Ofer; Limor, Yoav (2007). Captives in Lebanon, the truth about the Second Lebanon War (Hebrew). Yediot books. 

Chapter 1 Hannibal

• The final Winograd Commission report (Hebrew)