Gadi Eizenkot
Gadi EizenkotIDF Spokesperson

IDF Chief of Staff Gadi Eizenkot said Tuesday morning that Israel’s military was working to secure the nation’s northern border, but warned that the Iranian-backed Hezbollah terror group in Lebanon had become Israel’s greatest security challenge.

“We are successfully keeping our northern border quiet, to maintain our interests in the north, and to prevent terrorist groups from gaining strength or acquiring advanced weapons,” said Eizenkot in an address to a conference at Netanyahu Academic College.

“Hezbollah is the number one challenge facing the IDF,” said Eizenkot, adding that Israel was paying close attention to “the regular use of tactical chemical weapons in the fighting in Syria.”

On Monday, a Hezbollah spokesperson claimed the terror group had downed an Israeli unmanned aerial vehicle operating over Syria, releasing images of the destroyed drone.

The IDF acknowledged that one of its drones had fallen over the Syrian-occupied portion of the Golan Heights Sunday night, but added that no sensitive information could be recovered by hostile forces from the unmanned aircraft.