Iran Update, January 14, 2024

Information Cutoff: 2:00 pm EST

CTP-ISW published abbreviated updates on January 13 and 14, 2024. Detailed coverage will resume Monday, January 15, 2024.

The Iran Update provides insights into Iranian and Iranian-sponsored activities abroad that undermine regional stability and threaten US forces and interests. It also covers events and trends that affect the stability and decision-making of the Iranian regime. The Critical Threats Project (CTP) at the American Enterprise Institute and the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) provides these updates regularly based on regional events. For more on developments in Iran and the region, see our interactive map of Iran and the Middle East.

Note: CTP and ISW have refocused the update to cover the Israel-Hamas war. The new sections address developments in the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, Lebanon, and Syria, as well as noteworthy activity from Iran’s Axis of Resistance. We do not report in detail on war crimes because these activities are well-covered in Western media and do not directly affect the military operations we are assessing and forecasting. We utterly condemn violations of the laws of armed conflict and the Geneva Conventions and crimes against humanity even though we do not describe them in these reports.

Click here to see CTP and ISW’s interactive map of Israeli ground operations. This map is updated daily alongside the static maps present in this report.

Key Takeaways:

1. Israel Defense Forces units in the central Gaza Strip are isolating Maghazi.
2. The Israel Defense Forces continued clearing operations in Khan Younis City.
3. The Israel Defense Forces continued clearing operations in the northern Gaza Strip around Atatra and Beit Lahia.
4. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reiterated that Israel will continue its fight against Hamas until the IDF achieves a “complete victory.
5. Hamas’ al Qassem Brigades and Palestinian Islamic Jihad’s al Quds Brigades each conducted one rocket attack targeting southern Israel.
6. Palestinian fighters targeted Israeli forces in five locations across the West Bank.
7. Iranian-backed militias, including Lebanese Hezbollah, conducted nine attacks from southern Lebanon into northern Israel.
8. The Islamic Resistance in Iraq—a coalition of Iranian-backed Iraqi militias—claimed two attacks on US forces in northwestern Syria.

Gaza Strip

Axis of Resistance campaign objectives:

• Erode the will of the Israeli political establishment and public to launch and sustain a major ground operation into the Gaza Strip
• Degrade IDF material and morale around the Gaza Strip.

Israel Defense Forces (IDF) units in the central Gaza Strip are isolating Maghazi. Commercially available satellite imagery captured on January 14 showed flattened terrain north, east, and south of Maghazi, indicating that Israeli armor and bulldozers operated in the area. The IDF Golani Brigade directed an airstrike targeting two Palestinian fighters who were moving toward Israeli troops in a building in Maghazi.[i]

The IDF continued clearing operations in Khan Younis City on January 14. Commercially available satellite imagery captured on January 14 showed flattened terrain southeast of Khan Younis City and within the city, indicating that Israeli armor and bulldozers operated in the area. The IDF 7th Brigade (assigned to the 36th Division) captured a tunnel shaft in Khan Younis City on January 14.[ii] Palestinian media reported IDF forces fighting south of Khan Younis City on January 13 and 14.[iii]

The IDF continued clearing operations in the northern Gaza Strip around Atatra and Beit Lahia on January 14. The IDF 401st Brigade (assigned to the 162nd Division) destroyed rocket launch sites near Atatra on January 14.[iv] Commercially available satellite imagery captured on January 14 showed flattened terrain northwest of Beit Lahia, indicating that Israeli armor and bulldozers operated in the area.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reiterated on January 14 that Israel will continue its fight against Hamas until the IDF achieves a “complete victory.”[v] Netanyahu said that he told US Secretary of State Antony Blinken that the Israel-Hamas War is also the United States’ war because Israel is fighting Iran’s Axis of Resistance. Netanyahu’s stated war aims are destroying Hamas as a governing body and military force, rescuing the Israeli hostages, and “deradicalizing Palestinian society.”

Hamas’ al Qassem Brigades and Palestinian Islamic Jihad’s al Quds Brigades each conducted one rocket attack targeting southern Israel on January 14.[vi]

West Bank

Axis of Resistance campaign objectives:

• Draw IDF assets and resources toward the West Bank and fix them there

Palestinian fighters targeted Israeli forces in five locations across the West Bank on January 14.[vii] The al Qassem Brigades’ Jenin Battalion and the Jenin Battalion of the al Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades claimed multiple shooting and IED attacks targeting Israeli forces in Jenin.[viii]

This map is not an exhaustive depiction of clashes and demonstrations in the West Bank.

Southern Lebanon and Golan Heights

Axis of Resistance campaign objectives:

• Draw IDF assets and resources toward northern Israel and fix them there
• Set conditions for successive campaigns into northern Israel

Iranian-backed militias, including Lebanese Hezbollah (LH), conducted nine attacks from southern Lebanon into northern Israel on January 14.[ix] LH fighters killed an Israeli civilian and a member of the local security forces in Kfar Yuval.[x] Islamic Azz Brigades fighters, which may be front for LH, infiltrated into northern Israel under the cover of dense fog and clashed with Israeli forces at close range.[xi] Five IDF soldiers were injured in the clashes and three infiltrating fighters were killed.[xii]

Recorded reports of attacks; CTP-ISW cannot independently verify impact.

Iran and Axis of Resistance

Axis of Resistance campaign objectives:

• Demonstrate the capability and willingness of Iran and the Axis of Resistance to escalate against the United States and Israel on multiple fronts
• Set conditions to fight a regional war on multiple fronts

The Islamic Resistance in Iraq—a coalition of Iranian-backed Iraqi militias—claimed two attacks on US forces in northwestern Syria on January 13.[xiii] The group fired rockets at Rumaylan Landing Zone in Hasakah Province and launched drones at al Omar oil field in Deir ez Zor Province.