Southern Lebanon's Ali al-Taher ridge, which the Israeli army on Thursday said it captured, was a strategic position for Iran-backed Hezbollah, where it was believed to have established a command center.
Hezbollah did not confirm losing the highland, which is around 10 kilometers (six miles) from the border with Israel and was targeted by several Israeli strikes in recent weeks despite a ceasefire.
The ridge, a flashpoint since Hezbollah drew Lebanon into the Middle East war in March, lies close to the major city of Nabatieh and the Litani River.
It is just a few kilometers from UNESCO-listed Beaufort castle, another strategic site that Israel captured in recent months and continues to occupy.
Ali al-Taher ridge, on the edge of the Israeli-proclaimed occupied "security zone", overlooks surrounding areas and key districts further north, and sits atop a network of tunnels.
During US-mediated negotiations between Lebanon and Israel, Washington proposed the Lebanese military take over the ridge, but Hezbollah refused, according to a source close to the talks.
Military expert Riad Kahwaji told AFP that the ridge is "in between several villages and adjacent to the city of Nabatieh" with a "web of tunnels (that) connects these villages around it".
On Friday, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said the capture "marks the completion of the phase of securing control in the security zone in southern Lebanon", meaning the Lebanese territory Israel occupied during the war.
- 'Command centers' -
The Israeli military on Thursday said that the tunnel network included "command centers (and) weapons storage rooms".
"The infrastructure is a strategic underground network that was built over two decades and funded and planned by the Iranian terror regime," it added.
Kahwaji, who heads the INEGMA military analysis institute, said the hilltops overlook Iqlim al-Tuffah, an area further from the border where Hezbollah holds sway, as well as part of the country's east.
Control of the area would therefore "give the Israelis an easy passage to move on both sides".
Speaking to journalists including AFP last month, Hezbollah spokesman Youssef al-Zein refused to say how many of the group's fighters were at the Ali al-Taher position. He denied any Iranian personnel were there, as had been reported in some media outlets.
He claimed that Israel had "exaggerated the importance of Ali al-Taher" as a military objective but also vowed that Hezbollah would "defend this position as much as it can".
The ridge is located right above the Litani. Hezbollah agreed to disarm in areas south of the river under a 2024 ceasefire that sought to end its previous war with Israel.
Two years later, Hezbollah dragged Lebanon into the broader Middle East war by attacking Israel in support of Iran.
Israel responded with airstrikes and a ground invasion that Lebanon says have killed more than 4,300 people.
The conflict has calmed since a US-Iran memorandum of understanding and a framework agreement between Lebanon and Israel agreed in June. But Israeli strikes continue and violence persisted around Ali al-Taher.
On August 15, Israel's army launched its deadliest strikes in weeks in response to what it said was a Hezbollah attack against its soldiers in the area.
In June, Israel's army published an updated map showing the parts of south Lebanon it considers within its "security zone" where its troops are operating, expanding the area to include the Ali al-Taher ridge.
