Lebanese Security Source to Asharq Al-Awsat: Safieddine Likely Killed in Israeli Strike

Senior Hezbollah official Hashem Safieddine (C) attends the funeral ceremony of slain top commander Fuad Shukr in Beirut's southern suburbs on August 1, 2024. (AFP)
Senior Hezbollah official Hashem Safieddine (C) attends the funeral ceremony of slain top commander Fuad Shukr in Beirut's southern suburbs on August 1, 2024. (AFP)
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Lebanese Security Source to Asharq Al-Awsat: Safieddine Likely Killed in Israeli Strike

Senior Hezbollah official Hashem Safieddine (C) attends the funeral ceremony of slain top commander Fuad Shukr in Beirut's southern suburbs on August 1, 2024. (AFP)
Senior Hezbollah official Hashem Safieddine (C) attends the funeral ceremony of slain top commander Fuad Shukr in Beirut's southern suburbs on August 1, 2024. (AFP)

A Lebanese security sources told Asharq Al-Awsat that Hashem Safieddine, the potential successor to Hassan Nasrallah as secretary general of Hezbollah in Lebanon, was killed in an Israeli strike on the southern suburbs of Beirut last week.

It added that the Iran-backed party has so far refrained from announcing his death until it can retrieve his corpse.

Israeli drones have been flying around the clock for the fifth consecutive day over the targeted area that its jets bombed with around 73 tons of explosives.

The Israeli army said it had struck a Hezbollah intelligence headquarters.

An Israeli a government spokesperson said on Monday that Tel Aviv could not confirm Safieddine was killed in the attack.

Asked if Israel could confirm the death, spokesperson David Mencer told an online briefing: "We don't have that confirmation yet. When it is confirmed, as and when, it will be on the IDF (Israeli military) website."

A Hezbollah official told Reuters on Sunday that Israel was obstructing search and rescue efforts in an area where Safieddine is thought to have been when Israel bombed the area on Thursday.

Israel has killed much of Hezbollah's military command and senior leadership in nearly a year of fighting that began when Hezbollah opened a front in solidarity with Palestinians the day after Hamas' deadly Oct. 7, 2023 attack on southern Israel.



Israel Starts Ground Operations in Southwest Lebanon

Israeli soldiers move shells, amid cross-border hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel, in northern Israel, October 7, 2024. REUTERS/Gil Eliyahu
Israeli soldiers move shells, amid cross-border hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel, in northern Israel, October 7, 2024. REUTERS/Gil Eliyahu
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Israel Starts Ground Operations in Southwest Lebanon

Israeli soldiers move shells, amid cross-border hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel, in northern Israel, October 7, 2024. REUTERS/Gil Eliyahu
Israeli soldiers move shells, amid cross-border hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel, in northern Israel, October 7, 2024. REUTERS/Gil Eliyahu

Israel's military said on Tuesday it had begun ground operations in southwest Lebanon, expanding its incursions to a new zone.

The military piled more pressure on Iran-backed Hezbollah, saying it was conducting "limited, localized, targeted operations" in Lebanon's southwest after announcing such operations for the southeast border area.

The United Nations Special Coordinator for Lebanon and the head of the UN's peacekeeping mission in the country said on Tuesday that their repeated appeals for restraint had "gone unheeded" in the year since the exchanges of fire began between Hezbollah and Israel.

"Today, one year later, the near-daily exchanges of fire have escalated into a relentless military campaign whose humanitarian impact is nothing short of catastrophic," they said in a joint statement.

The Israeli military has described its ground operation in Lebanon as localized and limited, but it has steadily increased in scale beginning last week.

The army says its aim is to clear border areas where Hezbollah fighters have been embedded, with no plans to go deep into Lebanon.