Jerusalem | The Israeli military on Tuesday ordered the evacuation of nearly two dozen Lebanese border communities.

The orders came hours after Israel sent ground forces into southern Lebanon in what it described as a limited incursion against the Hezbollah militant group.

The evacuation order, posted by the Israeli military's Arabic spokesman on the social media platform X, specified around two dozen communities in southern Lebanon and ordered people to evacuate north of the Awali River, some 60 kilometers (36 miles) from the border.

That is farther than the Litani River, which marks the northern edge of a UN-declared zone that was intended to serve as a buffer between Israel and Hezbollah after the 2006 war. The Litani River is 30 kilometers (18 miles) from the border.