IDF Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi of the Israel Defense Forces invited the public to visit the northern part of the country despite last Friday's rocket attack on the Nahariya area. Speaking at a ceremony with local government leaders at the headquarters of the army's northern command, Ashkenazi that he would bring his family north for the upcoming holidays.
The lieutenant-general said Israel is closely following developments in southern Lebanon and that while Hizbullah was not interested in disturbing the relative calm of recent months, defense forces were not complacent. While Hizbullah was tied to the summertime explosion of an arms cache at a site that included chemical weapons, other terror groups say they were the ones who carried out recent armed attacks against Israel.