Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant visited troops on the northern border on Saturday and reiterated that Israel had no interest in engaging in a war there, Reuters reports.

“But we are prepared for every mission,” Gallant said in a statement. “Yahya Sinwar made a mistake and sealed Hamas’s fate in Gaza and of Gaza,” he said of the fighter group’s chief in Gaza.

He said that if Nasrallah of Hezbollah makes “a mistake, he will determine Lebanon’s fate”.

The Lebanon-Israel border has seen regular cross-border shelling over the past month, with firing between the Israeli military on one side and the powerful Hezbollah and its allies on the other.