This was the last structure, on the last day of 890 in the Kasbah neighborhood of Bint Jbeil. Something about that detection lit up a red flag for the fighters. “They approach the door and see it’s half-open,” recalls the sniper team leader, Lieutenant A., for the first time in three weeks. “Now, there’s no such thing as a half-open door in a Kasbah after two weeks of activity – either they’re blown open by explosions, or they’re locked from the inside.”
They decide to fly in a drone, which identifies only some weapons and cans of food on the stairs. Only one step remains before the forces enter themselves: “Throughout the fighting, the Oketz unit is with us in the assaults. This time too, the Oketz team leader sends in a bomb-sniffing dog to detect explosives, which returns without any unusual findings, as a trap wasn’t the problem here. Nevertheless, there’s a feeling that this is a different case and we need to delay, so another sweep is conducted with the attack dog Bernie.”
Corporal A., Lieutenant A., and Corporal R.
Within a few moments, a burst of gunfire is heard. Thanks to Bernie, who even managed to bite one of the terrorists – the force commander realizes that militants are hiding in the building. “I remember hearing the team leader’s shout,” says Corporal A., a sniper from Battalion 890, who was in a nearby observation post overlooking the entire event. “We followed the D9 and the tank with our eyes as they turned back, and we saw smoke rising from that house. Corporal R. next to me was already focused on the terrorists with his scope. He directed us so we could open additional firing angles towards the enemy.”
The exchange of fire quickly moved to the roof, where two of the terrorists ascended while continuing to fire at the forces inside. “We hit one, and eliminated him on the spot. After a minute, maybe even less, another head appeared – and we took him down too,” says Corporal R. The rest of the task force continued to encircle the location using drones, guided missiles, tank shells, and more.
About fifteen minutes after the first encirclement, Corporal R. and the team leader identified another detail: “It was a very suspicious movement, a shadow in a window that looked like a person, but wasn’t moving.” Simultaneously, the drone team members were reviewing the footage from the encounter and reported that likely 6 terrorists were in the area, not 2. “We cross-referenced the information, continued to observe, and suddenly a hand appeared in the window. We immediately directed a barrage at it until the threat was definitively neutralized.”
“These are terrorists we saw with our own eyes firing Kalachnikov bursts at our comrades from the battalion,” declares Corporal R., “ones who, if we hadn’t eliminated them, things would have looked different. And it’s truly a great satisfaction.” In total, the snipers eliminated 3 out of 6 terrorists, and the rest of the battalion completed the mission against the remaining members of the cell – despite the enemy’s initial height advantage.
When the incident was finally concluded, the force evacuated to a safe location and began the debriefing. “There we understood how well the different units worked together, by the book,” explains Lieutenant A., “We handled this encounter as we should have, and without any casualties or injuries among the battalion’s soldiers. Unfortunately, we lost Bernie, the four-legged warrior, who undoubtedly saved lives.”
The elimination of the entire cell is a very significant achievement, especially considering that this is the team’s first operation (March 2025 conscripts) beyond enemy lines. For Corporal A., it only sank in on the return trip in the ‘Tetra’ (military vehicle – Sh.Sh.) to the assembly area: “The first thing I wanted to do was check if I had battery left on my phone and call my mom, dad, brother, and girlfriend. To tell them I was okay.”
“Only then did we truly process everything we had been through, because it was very fresh, just a few hours earlier we were still in the encounter,” his teammate, Corporal R., reinforces his words. “When you tell people what you’ve been through, it relieves some of the pressure. At that moment, I felt I could take a breath.”
Now, the transition to the Gaza front is being carried out by 890 with the same norms, standards, and operational discipline that characterized the fighting on the rooftops in Lebanon – and the elimination of the 6 terrorists in particular. As Corporal A. shares: “It helps me to remind myself that precisely when I let my guard down, danger will surprise me. And there’s no chance I’ll have a terrorist in my sights and not hit him; I’m not willing to fail at the critical moment.”
