Iran Update, June 30, 2024

Information Cutoff: 2:00 pm ET

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. 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. Click here to subscribe to the Iran Update.

CTP-ISW defines the “Axis of Resistance” as the unconventional alliance that Iran has cultivated in the Middle East since the Islamic Republic came to power in 1979. This transnational coalition is comprised of state, semi-state, and non-state actors that cooperate to secure their collective interests. Tehran considers itself to be both part of the alliance and its leader. Iran furnishes these groups with varying levels of financial, military, and political support in exchange for some degree of influence or control over their actions. Some are traditional proxies that are highly responsive to Iranian direction, while others are partners over which Iran exerts more limited influence. Members of the Axis of Resistance are united by their grand strategic objectives, which include eroding and eventually expelling American influence from the Middle East, destroying the Israeli state, or both. Pursuing these objectives and supporting the Axis of Resistance to those ends have become cornerstones of Iranian regional strategy.

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.

Key Takeaways:

• Gaza Strip: Israeli forces continued re-clearing Shujaiya in Gaza City. Hamas combat units began reconstituting there after Israeli forces withdrew in April 2024.
• West Bank: Israeli forces conducted a drone strike killing a senior PIJ official in Tulkarm. The official was responsible for recent militia activity targeting civilian and military targets.
• Northern Israel: Lebanese Hezbollah conducted 10 attacks into northern Israel. One of the attacks involved a one-way attack drone that injured nine Israelis.

Gaza Strip

Axis of Resistance objectives:

• Erode the will of the Israeli political establishment and public to sustain clearing operations in the Gaza Strip
• Reestablish Hamas as the governing authority in the Gaza Strip

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) 98th Division continued clearing operations in Shujaiya, Gaza City, on June 30. The IDF began operations in Shujaiya to degrade a reconstituted Hamas battalion and to demolish underground military infrastructure on June 27.[i] The IDF Paratroopers Brigade and 7th Brigade are leading the raid with support from the Givati and Golani brigades.[ii] The IDF first focused on raiding a Hamas facility in a school in central Shujaiya, where Israeli forces seized weapons and Hamas intelligence documents.[iii] An Israeli military correspondent reported the raid in Shujaiya is expected to take several weeks to complete.[iv] IDF 98th Division elements directed dozens of strikes on Palestinian militia infrastructure in Shujaiya.[v]

Palestinian militias have claimed at least 11 attacks targeting Israeli forces in Shujaiya since CTP-ISW's last data cut-off on June 29.[vi] This attack rate is consistent with Israeli reports that Palestinian fighters are engaging Israeli forces in Shujaiya but that the intensity of fighting does not meet the level the IDF encountered in Jabalia weeks prior.[vii] IDF officers previously described the fighting in Jabalia during the May 2024 re-clearing operation as some of the most intense of the war.[viii]

The IDF 99th Division continued operations along the Netzarim corridor south of Gaza City on June 30.[ix] Israeli forces destroyed Palestinian militia infrastructure near the corridor.[x] Palestinian fighters, including Hamas, conducted at least four indirect fire attacks targeting Israeli forces along the corridor.[xi] Palestinian militias have also consistently targeted Israeli armor south of Tal al Hawa since June 27.[xii] Commercially available satellite imagery indicated that Israeli armor has systematically cleared land north of the Netzarim corridor near Tal al Hawa since June 20.

Israeli forces continued operations in several areas of Rafah on June 30.[xiii] The IDF 162nd Brigade engaged several Palestinian fighters and destroyed tunnel shafts in Rafah.[xiv] The IDF 12th Brigade and Yahalom combat engineering unit have uncovered and destroyed a tunnel network in eastern Rafah over the past week.[xv] The tunnel had several entrance points, including one near a school.[xvi]  The IDF Air Force struck and destroyed a mortar in a tunnel shaft and at least nine rocket launch positions in Rafah.[xvii] Local Palestinian sources reported that IDF armor repositioned in Brazil neighborhood, central Rafah, and Shakoush, western Rafah.[xviii] Hamas targeted an Israeli military bulldozer with an explosively formed penetrator, setting it on fire, south of Tal al Hawa in western Rafah on June 29.[xix] Palestinian fighters targeted Israeli forces with rockets, rocket propelled grenades (RPG), and improvised explosive devices (IED) in southwestern Rafah.[xx] Palestinian fighters also targeted Israeli forces in eastern and central Rafah.[xxi]

Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) and the Palestinian Mujahideen Movement separately targeted an IDF site in Israel east of Shujaiya on June 30.[xxii]

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

West Bank

Axis of Resistance objectives:

• Establish the West Bank as a viable front against Israel

The IDF conducted a drone strike that killed senior PIJ member Saeed Jaber in Nour Shams refugee camp, Tulkarm, on June 30.[xxiii] The IDF and Shin Bet monitored and targeted four ”senior” Palestinian militia members inside an apartment in Nour Shams’ al Manshiya neighborhood.[xxiv] The IDF reported that the strike killed Jaber and an unspecified number of fighters tied to an attack that killed an Israeli citizen in Qalqilya on June 22.[xxv] The IDF said that the apartment was used to assemble IEDs and prepare for attacks.[xxvi] Palestinian sources reported that the strike injured five Palestinians.[xxvii]

PIJ described Jaber as one of the founders of PIJ’s Tulkarm Brigade.[xxviii] The IDF tied Jaber to recent shooting and IED attacks along the border wall near Bat Hefer.[xxix] The IDF also stated that Jaber directed attacks that used small arms and IEDs to target civilians and Israeli forces in Tulkarm.[xxx] Jaber is a relative of senior PIJ official Abu Shujaa and had previously survived an assassination attempt, according to Palestinian sources.[xxxi] Hamas and other Palestinian militias released statements mourning Jaber’s death.[xxxii] Palestinian sources reported that thousands of Palestinians marched in Jaber’s funeral in Nour Shams.[xxxiii]

Israeli forces raided Faraa refugee camp in Tubas and detained several wanted Palestinians on June 30.[xxxiv] The al Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades engaged Israeli forces in Faraa refugee camp with small arms and detonated IEDs.[xxxv]

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

Southern Lebanon and Golan Heights

Axis of Resistance objectives:

• Deter Israel from conducting a ground operation into Lebanon
• Prepare for an expanded and protracted conflict with Israel in the near term
• Expel the United States from Syria

Lebanese Hezbollah conducted at least 10 attacks into northern Israel since CTP-ISW's data cut off on June 29.[xxxvi] Hezbollah stated that it launched a drone attack targeting the IDF 188th Brigade’s Armored Battalion at Rawiya barracks in the Golan Heights on June 30.[xxxvii] Israeli Army Radio reported that an explosive drone exploded near Merom Golan and injured nine people.[xxxviii]

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

Iran and Axis of Resistance

Nothing significant to report.