2024-08-04 14:28:37
Israel’s military confirms an attack on a Hezbollah commander in Beirut. The air strike is apparently a response to the shelling of a town in the Golan Heights.
Three days after a deadly rocket attack on the Golan Heights, Israel carried out a “targeted attack” on a commander of the Shiite militia Hezbollah in the Lebanese capital Beirut, the Israeli army reported.
An explosion was heard in southern Beirut. Images on social media show a destroyed apartment building as well as rubble and smoke. Defense Minister Joav Galant wrote on Platform X that Hezbollah had crossed a “red line.”
The commander was “responsible for the murder of the children of Majdal Shams and numerous other Israeli civilians,” the army said in a statement. According to Israeli sources, at least twelve children and young people were killed when a rocket fired from Lebanon hit the Golan Heights.
According to a media report and security sources, a woman died and seven other people were injured in the Israeli shelling on Tuesday. It is not yet known whether the Hezbollah commander was killed in the attack. However, security sources said he survived the attack. According to media reports, the man is Muhsin “Fuad” Shukr, an adviser to Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah. Shukr is said to have been active in the militia for more than 40 years, it is said.
In 1983, he is said to have planned an attack on a military base in Beirut in which 241 US soldiers died. The US State Department had offered a reward of up to five million US dollars for information leading to his capture.
According to rescue workers, a civilian was killed in a rocket attack on northern Israel that afternoon. Before that, there had been a rocket alert in towns on the border with Lebanon.
Since the beginning of the Gaza war, there have been repeated confrontations between Israel’s army and militant groups such as Hezbollah in the Israeli-Lebanese border region. The Shiite militia says it is acting in solidarity with Hamas:
They will not stop their attacks until there is a ceasefire in Gaza. Numerous civilians have been killed in both Israel and Lebanon. Tens of thousands of residents have left their homes on both sides of the border. It is the most serious escalation since the second Lebanon war in 2006.