War in GazaWorld

Israel assassinates another top Hezbollah commander

BEIRUT, Lebanon – Israel has assassinated one of Hezbollah’s most senior officials in an airstrike in a residential area of Beirut, the Lebanese capital.

The airstrike has reportedly killed twelve people and wounded 66, a preliminary assessment by Lebanon’s Ministry of Health revealed.

“Ibrahim Aqil, the Head of Hezbollah’s Operations Unit and the Commander of Hezbollah’s elite Radwan Forces, was eliminated in a targeted intellligence-based strike in Beirut earlier today,” the Israel Defense Forces said in a statement post on X on Friday.

“During the strike, senior operatives in Hezbollah’s Operations Staff and commanders from the Radwan Unit were eliminated alongside Aqil. Ibrahim Aqil and the Radwan commanders who were eliminated today were planning Hezbollah’s ‘Conquer the Galilee attack plan, in which Hezbollah intended to infiltrate Israeli communities and kidnap and murder innocent civilians in a similar manner to the October 7 Massacre,” the statement said.

Israel assassinates another top Hezbollah commander

Aqil, also known as Tahsin, had a $7 million reward on his head, wanted by the U.S. “During the 1980s, Aqil was a principal member of Hezbollah’s terrorist cell the Islamic Jihad Organization, which claimed responsibility for the bombings of the U.S. Embassy in Beirut in April 1983, which killed 63 people, and the U.S. Marine Corps barracks in October 1983, which killed 241 U.S. personnel,” a rewards notice issued by the U.S. State Department on 18 April 2023 said.

“Also in the 1980s, Aqil directed the taking of American and German hostages in Lebanon and held them there,” the statement said.

Hezbollah has yet to confirm the death of Aqil, however if the Israeli army’s claim is correct, it will be the second major assassination of a leading Hezbollah commander in the past two months. An Israeli airstrike targeted and killed the group’s top military commander Fuad Shukr in July.

Friday’s assassination of Aqil follows a turbulent, and unprecedented week for Hezbollah, which was besieged with the simultaneous explosion across Lebanon of thousands of pagers and walkie-talkie radios, many held by members of the group. Thirty-seven people were killed in those attacks, including two children and the son of a Lebanese parliamentarian, while thousands were injured.

The week’s events have triggered an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council on Friday.

Uploaded image

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk told ambassadors he was “appalled by the breadth and impact” of the wireless device attacks over two days this week, which killed 37, and wounded more than 4,000.

“These attacks represent a new development in warfare, where communication tools become weapons,” he said, noting that unexploded devices had been made dismantled in universities and hospitals.

“This cannot be the new normal, war has rules for each and any party to this – and any other armed conflict,” he told the Security Council Friday.

Related Articles

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *