Israeli Defense Chief Warns Iraqi Militias, Houthis Can Infiltrate Israel on Ground

Israel's Defense Ministry Director General, retired Major General Amir Baram, warned on Tuesday that Iraqi militias and Yemen's Houthi forces pose a concrete threat to Israel, including the ability to carry out ground infiltrations into Israeli territory. Baram made the assessment at a high-level strategic workshop attended by dozens of senior officials from across government ministries and the defense establishment.

Baram said "the eastern border is today the most sensitive arena from a security standpoint," attributing the shift to the degradation of previously dominant threats. "Hamas is not the same Hamas, Hezbollah is not the same Hezbollah, and Syria is not the same Syria," he said. "In terms of the ability to reach Israel on the ground, the militias in Iraq and the Houthis in Yemen are absolutely a threat, even if they are far away."

The warning comes with notable weight behind it. Before taking his current post, Baram served as Deputy Chief of the General Staff and is regarded as one of the most senior figures with direct familiarity with Israel's intelligence picture. His remarks were presented not as theoretical analysis but as an operational concern requiring an immediate structural response.

Defense Ministry representatives at the conference stressed the urgent need to reinforce and expand engineering barriers along Israel's eastern frontier. Current physical obstacle infrastructure in the sector, together with existing IDF deployment, does not adequately address the evolving ground threats identified by military planners, according to assessments presented at the event.

The eastern border has historically received less defensive investment than the borders with Gaza and Lebanon, where costly barrier systems were built following repeated security incidents. The defense establishment's focus on those fronts, particularly during and after the October 7, 2023 Hamas attack and the subsequent conflicts in Gaza and Lebanon, left the eastern axis with relatively little physical fortification.

The updated threat picture follows broader regional changes. With Hamas significantly weakened in Gaza and Hezbollah badly damaged following the Lebanon fighting, Iran's proxy network has leaned increasingly on forces operating further from Israel's borders - mainly the Houthis in Yemen and armed factions based in Iraq. Both have demonstrated throughout the current conflict the capacity to project force toward Israel, primarily via long-range missiles and drones. The concern now being raised at senior defense levels is that ground infiltration scenarios from these actors are a real operational possibility.

The seminar brought together senior representatives from multiple government ministries alongside defense officials, a sign that the eastern border question is moving beyond a purely military discussion into broader national security and policy territory. The push to reinforce that frontier is expected to feed into budgetary and planning decisions in the months ahead.