TEL AVIV, October 4. /TASS/. Israel is conducting an operation in several villages in southern Lebanon and will continue it until all Hezbollah military facilities from which attacks on the Jewish state were plotted are destroyed, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said on a visit to the country’s northern border areas.

"We are running an operation in several villages, and this process will be continued where necessary to destroy all facilities from where Hezbollah planned to attack," Ynet quoted Israel’s defense chief as saying.

"We will make sure we can safely return residents [of northern Israel] to their homes, as promised," Gallant said with confidence.

Earlier, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) warned residents of 30 localities in southern Lebanon to evacuate their homes.

Israel has been delivering massive airstrikes on Hezbollah military targets since it launched Operation Northern Arrows in Lebanon on September 23. The stated goal is to create a safe environment to return dozens of thousands of locals who have been evacuated from border areas in northern Israel. The Lebanese Shia movement Hezbollah’s Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah was killed in an Israeli airstrike on Beirut on September 27. In the early hours of Tuesday, the Israeli army launched a limited ground operation across its northern border into Lebanon.