Israel kills top Hezbollah commander in Beirut attack

People and first responders gather in front of a building targeted by an Israeli strike in Beirut's southern suburbs on September 20, 2024. (AFP)
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Updated 21 September 2024
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Israel kills top Hezbollah commander in Beirut attack

  • Airstrike that targeted Ibrahim Aqil leaves 16 dead, 66 injured
  • A number of people went missing following the strike, and families were searching for their children and relatives

BEIRUT: Israel killed a top Hezbollah commander in an airstrike on Beirut’s southern suburbs on Friday, sharply escalating the year-long conflict between Israel and the Iran-backed group.
The target was Hezbollah’s operations commander Ibrahim Aqil, who served on the group’s top military body.
Aqil was killed alongside members of Hezbollah’s elite Radwan Unit as they were holding a meeting in a 10-story building in the area of Al-Jamous, sources said.
The strike killed 16 people and wounded 66 others.

A number of people went missing following the strike, and families were searching for their children and relatives.
Sources told Arab News that Aqil and his colleagues were holding the meeting in an underground room, and therefore rescue workers were not able to retrieve their bodies four hours after the explosion.
An eyewitness told Arab News: “The strike leveled the building, which was residential, and it is difficult to determine the number of victims inside.”
Israeli media reported that the target, Aqil, was a “prominent Hezbollah member who directs the fighting in southern Lebanon.”
The US State Department had previously offered a reward of up to $7 million for information leading to Aqil’s arrest, stating that he is a “member of Hezbollah’s Jihad Council and accused of the 1983 bombings of the Marine barracks and the US Embassy.”
Black smoke was seen rising from the site as people fled in all directions.
Hezbollah ambulances arrived at the scene, and paramedics were seen pulling out the injured, including children and the elderly. Hezbollah members quickly cordoned off the area.
The Israeli army described its attack as a “precise operation,” targeting a senior Hezbollah official.
The targeted building is near the Al-Qaem Mosque, which is affiliated with Hezbollah, and the area is considered within the party’s security zone.
This operation is the third of its kind targeting Beirut’s southern suburb, following the assassination of Hezbollah military official Fuad Shukr a month ago, and prior to that, Hamas leader Saleh Al-Arouri in January.
The operation comes amid a military escalation between Hezbollah and the Israeli army following mass explosions that targeted communication devices used by Hezbollah members on Tuesday and Wednesday, resulting in dozens of deaths and thousands of injuries.
On Friday, Hezbollah launched dozens of rockets toward Israeli military sites, one of which hit Al-Ulayqa base for the first time, located north of Katzrin in the occupied Syrian Golan Heights, approximately 20 km from the Lebanese border.
The escalation coincided with Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah’s Thursday speech, in which he vowed retaliation against Israel for its crime.
He described the explosions that hit the party as “major Israeli aggression that will face a severe reckoning and just retribution.”
Nasrallah added: “The real news is in what you will see, not what you will hear, and we are keeping it within a tight circle.”
Hezbollah launched Katyusha rockets at the 210th Golan Division headquarters in Nafah, and targeted the “command headquarters of the Golan Division’s military gathering at Yarden barracks,” the “headquarters of rocketry and artillery battalion in Yoav barracks,” and the “newly established headquarters of the 91st Division at Ayelet HaShahar.”
Israeli media reported that “Hezbollah launched around 150 rockets, with the last salvo consisting of 20 rockets aimed at the Meron airbase in Upper Galilee.”

In the last 24 hours, Hezbollah continued to shell the Metula site, targeting, according to its statement, “Israeli soldiers’ position with a guided missile.”
The Israeli side confirmed that rockets hit the site. Hezbollah also struck “the main air defense base of the Northern Command at the Birya barracks with volleys of Katyusha rockets.”
The Israeli army confirmed that “two soldiers were killed and nine others injured in Hezbollah’s attacks on the border with Lebanon.” The army’s statement added: “The remaining injuries were caused by drone explosions that targeted Western Galilee.”
Since Thursday night and well into Friday, the Israeli army bombarded the southern Lebanese border areas with dozens of artillery shells, airstrikes, and ground sweeps from its military positions.
Israel’s Channel 14 reported: “The Israeli army will increase its attacks on Lebanon, with the number reaching dozens daily, starting this evening. Lebanon, not Gaza, is now Israel’s primary battlefield.”
The Israeli shelling on the town of Beit Lif resulted in the death of Hezbollah member Youssef Mohammed Al-Sayyed. Another member, Ali Hassan Al-Zein, was also mourned by Hezbollah.
Heavy shelling targeted Aita Al-Shaab, the outskirts of Alma Al-Shaab, Mays Al-Jabal, Odaisseh, Kfarkila, Al-Taybeh and Kfarshouba. Wadi Zebqine and the western sector were also subject to Israeli artillery shelling.
Israeli warplanes launched airstrikes on Odaisseh, Al-Taybeh, Aitaroun, Yaroun, Hanin and Aita Al-Shaab in Bint Jbeil.
Shortly after Nasrallah’s speech, the Israeli army carried out around 70 raids in 20 minutes over forested mountain areas in Mahmoudieh, Aaichiyeh, Al-Rehan and the surroundings of the Barghaz River in the south.
These raids caused “mountains to evaporate,” according to witnesses.
The Israeli army claimed that “it is attacking Hezbollah targets to damage and destroy its terrorist capabilities and military infrastructure.”
Israeli army spokesperson Avichay Adraee claimed that “air force fighter jets targeted hundreds of launch barrels set to immediately fire toward Israeli territory.”
Adraee stated that the Israeli army struck “over 100 rocket launchers and additional military infrastructures containing 1,000 launch barrels ready for immediate shooting.”
Adraee accused Hezbollah of “turning southern Lebanon into a war zone.”
He said: “For decades, Hezbollah has weaponized civilian homes, dug tunnels beneath them, and used civilians as human shields. The Israeli army is operating to bring security to northern Israel in order to enable the return of residents to their homes, and to achieve all the war goals.”
Israeli public broadcaster Kan announced that “Israel’s army chief, Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi, has approved battle plans for the northern front.”
In a separate statement, Israeli Minister of Defense Yoav Gallant announced that “he has been deliberating the various possibilities of the evolution of the campaign against Hezbollah on the northern border.”
Gallant said: “This is a new phase in the war; it has significant opportunities, but also heavy risks.”
He noted that “Hezbollah is feeling chased, and the sequence of our military operations will continue.”
Sabrina Singh, the Pentagon’s deputy press secretary, told Sky News Arabia that “Washington believes that the war between Israel and Lebanon is not imminent.
“The best way to lessen tensions on the Lebanese and Gazan fronts is through diplomatic means.”


Lebanon aid convoy driver injured after Israeli strike

Updated 4 sec ago
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Lebanon aid convoy driver injured after Israeli strike

  • Minister of Public Works and Transport Ali Hamieh told AFP that the convoy was carrying “humanitarian aid from the Lebanese government
Beirut: An Israeli strike hit an east Lebanon town as an aid convoy drove through it Tuesday, injuring one of its drivers, a governor and the state news agency said.
The governor of Baalbek, Bachir Khodr, on X reported “an Israeli strike very close to an aid convoy as it drove through the town of Ain” on its way to Ras Baalbek.
He posted a picture from the back window of the car he was in, showing a huge column of smoke billowing up into the sky dozens of meters (yards) behind it.
“The driver of the truck driving directly behind us was injured,” he added.
Israeli strikes hit Ain during “the passage of a convoy consisting of three trucks” heading toward the town of Ras Baalbek, said the National News Agency (NNA).
“One of the aid trucks heading to Ras Baalbek was damaged as a result of the blowback of the strike in Ain, which led to the injury of the truck driver.”
Minister of Public Works and Transport Ali Hamieh told AFP that the convoy was carrying “humanitarian aid from the Lebanese government.”
It “was traveling to the area accompanied by the Lebanese Red Cross with agreement from the United Nations,” he said.
The convoy was made up of five trucks, and carried aid from several countries including the United Arab Emirates and Turkiye.
Two had previously unloaded goods in Baalbek, NNA said.
Almost a year of cross-border fire, Israel on September 23 increased its strikes against Lebanese militant group Hezbollah in south and east Lebanon, as well as the capital’s southern suburbs.
The escalation has killed more than 1,300 people, according to an AFP tally of official figures.

‘Extremely valuable’ secret tomb uncovered in Jordan’s Petra

Updated 12 min 58 sec ago
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‘Extremely valuable’ secret tomb uncovered in Jordan’s Petra

  • 12 skeletons, hundreds of artifacts recovered as lead archaeologist hails ‘rare’ find
  • Discovery may offer new clues about ancient Arab society

LONDON: Archaeologists have uncovered human remains and hundreds of artifacts in a hidden tomb in Petra, Jordan, The Times reported.

The discovery of the 2,000-year-old underground site could help researchers solve long-running questions over the origins of the ancient city and those who built it.

Located underneath Petra’s Treasury, the tomb contained 12 well-preserved skeletons and hundreds of bronze, iron and ceramic artifacts.

The joint US-Jordanian archaeological team that made the discovery worked underneath the famous edifice, which has been featured in films including “Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.”

Based on the central location of the tomb within the UNESCO World Heritage Site, it is believed to have been commissioned by inhabitants of prominent social standing.

Hundreds more items are expected to be recovered as excavation continues, according to lead archaeologist Dr. Pearce Paul Creasman, executive director of the American Center of Research.

Petra’s Treasury was named as such because of an early theory that it held the treasure of a pharaoh, but most researchers today believe that it was a tomb built by Nabataean King Aretas IV, who ruled from about 9 B.C. to 40 A.D.

This has been supported by the latest discovery, as archaeologists believe the uncovered tomb predates the Treasury.

Creasman said his team dated the hidden tomb to the first century B.C. using luminescence dating, which tracks the last exposure of mineral grains to sunlight. The archaeologists first discovered the tomb using ground-penetrating radar.

The recovery of its contents is a rare event. Many other tombs have been discovered across Petra over the years but most were empty, having been used multiple times throughout the centuries.

“It is rare to find a tomb with human remains in Petra,” Creasman said. “So, when you do find one, that becomes extremely valuable.”

The first historical record of the Nabataean civilization was in 312 B.C. They had repelled an invasion launched by Antigonus, the former general and successor of Alexander the Great who inherited large parts of the Macedonian Empire.

“They just appear in the historical record and then it goes over a hundred years before we read about them in text again, by which time they have this fully fledged society and Petra is being built in the sense that we know it today,” Creasman said.

Little is known of early Nabataean society, though ancient recordings suggest that the civilization was remarkably egalitarian, as there is little difference between noble and common Nabataean tombs.

The discovery of the Petra tomb may offer new clues about the ancient Arab society, including diet and nutrition, Creasman said.

“This is going to help us learn more about a shared, regional past,” he added. “The Nabateans were a multicultural trading society who only worked because they united as a people. I hope they might be able to teach us something today.”


Israeli army says intercepts two drones approaching from Syria

Updated 5 min 26 sec ago
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Israeli army says intercepts two drones approaching from Syria

  • Israel is fighting a war on two fronts, one on its northern border with Lebanon, the other with Hamas in Gaza, while also facing attacks from Iran-backed militants in Syria, Iraq and Yemen

JERUSALEM: The Israeli military said it intercepted two drones approaching from Syria on Monday, a day after a drone attack by Lebanon’s Hezbollah on a base killed four soldiers.
“A short while ago, two UAVs that approached Israeli territory from Syria were successfully intercepted by the IAF (air force). The UAVs were intercepted before crossing into Israeli territory,” the military said in a statement.
Israel is fighting a war on two fronts, one on its northern border with Lebanon, the other with Hamas in Gaza, while also facing attacks from Iran-backed militants in Syria, Iraq and Yemen.
Hezbollah has historically relied on its ally Syria to transport arms and other equipment from its main backer Iran.
Israeli authorities rarely comment publicly about individual strikes or operations involving Syria, but have repeatedly said they will not allow Iran to expand its sway over the region.
Last week, the Israeli army said its forces killed a Hezbollah figure inside Syria, Adham Jahout, who was described as an intermediary who “relayed information from Syrian regime sources to the Hezbollah.”
Iran and Hezbollah have been among the Syrian government’s most important allies in the country’s more than decade-old civil war.
On October 30, an Israeli air strike hit a road linking Syria and Lebanon as Israel tried to cut off supply routes of Hezbollah, according to a Syrian war monitor.
That strike came less than a week after Israeli jets struck the main Lebanon-Syria border crossing of Masnaa in Lebanon’s eastern Bekaa Valley, cutting off the road to traffic.
A deadly strike blamed on Israel on April 1 against Iran’s diplomatic mission in Damascus levelled the embassy’s consular annex, killing seven Revolutionary Guard members, including two generals.
Nearly two weeks later, Iran launched a wave of missiles and drones at Israel, Tehran’s first-ever direct assault on Israeli territory since the establishment of its Islamic republic in 1979.


Hezbollah targets Israeli naval base after deadly drone strike

Updated 14 October 2024
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Hezbollah targets Israeli naval base after deadly drone strike

  • The group said its fighters launched rockets at a naval base near Haifa

BEIRUT: Hezbollah said it targeted an Israeli naval base on Monday, a day after a drone strike killed four soldiers in the deadliest attack on Israel since the war in Lebanon began.
The group said its fighters launched rockets at a naval base near Haifa in northern Israel, calling it a tribute to its leader, Hassan Nasrallah.
The Israeli military said on Monday it had intercepted another launch aimed at a training camp at Binyamina, also near Haifa, a day after four soldiers were killed and dozens more wounded in a Hezbollah drone strike.
On Monday, Israeli army chief Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi visited the Golani Brigade’s training camp in Binyamina, and told soldiers: “We are at war, and an attack on a training base on the home front is difficult and the results are painful.”
Israeli volunteer rescue service United Hatzalah said its teams in Binyamina assisted more than 60 people with mild to critical injuries.
Israel and Hezbollah have been at war since Israel intensified its strikes on Lebanon on September 23 and sent ground troops across the border a week later.
Israel has vowed to secure its northern border to allow tens of thousands of people displaced by nearly a year of Hezbollah rocket fire launched. Hezbollah says the rocket fire is in solidarity with its Palestinian ally, Hamas.
The war, which saw an expansion in fighting and air strikes around Lebanon at the weekend, has killed more than 1,300 people, according to an AFP tally of Lebanese health ministry figures.
On Sunday, Hezbollah threatened more attacks if Israel’s continues its offensive in Lebanon, warning Israel what it saw was “nothing compared to what awaits it if it decides to continue its aggression.”
Escalating violence
In Lebanon, Israel has expanded its air strikes mainly on Hezbollah strongholds, while its troops in south Lebanon have engaged in fierce fighting.
Hezbollah said it shelled Israeli troops inside a southern Lebanese village Monday, after saying it targeted soldiers elsewhere along the border.
Lebanon’s official National News Agency reported Sunday that Israeli forces had escalated air strikes on southern Lebanon, pounding border villages.
Lebanon’s health ministry said Israel’s strikes on Saturday killed 51 people, including 16 in Maaysra, a Shiite Muslim village in a Christian-majority area north of Beirut.
In Nabatiyeh, in the south, residents spoke of their shock and grief after its marketplace was hit on Saturday.
“I’m staying here and I will not leave... Nabatiyeh is our mother. It’s heartbreaking to see people’s livelihoods gone,” said Tarek Sadaka, barely holding back tears.
Others have fled the city, with more than one million Lebanese leaving areas that morphed into war zones within weeks.
A UN peacekeeping force deployed in Lebanon since Israel’s 1978 invasion has been thrust onto the front lines of the latest war, with Israel repeatedly calling on it to abandon their positions.
On Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called on them to withdraw for their own safety and said their presence had “the effect of providing Hezbollah terrorists with human shields.”
Five United Nations peacekeepers were injured in a series of incidents last week, with the latest seeing the UN force accuse Israeli troops of breaking through a gate and entering one of their positions.
The Israeli military later said a tank “backed several meters into a UNIFIL post” while “under fire” and attempting to evacuate injured soldiers.
UN chief Antonio Guterres said “attacks” against peacekeepers “may constitute a war crime.”
Three Lebanese soldiers were wounded on Sunday, the country’s army said, when Israeli forces fired on military vehicles in south Lebanon.
War on Gaza
The war in Lebanon erupted nearly a year after Hamas staged the deadliest-ever attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, sparking the conflict in Gaza.
The attack resulted in the deaths of 1,206 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of official Israeli figures.
The number includes hostages killed in captivity.
The war in Gaza has killed, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory, 42,289 people, the majority civilians. The UN has described the figures as reliable.
Gaza’s civil defense agency said Israeli shelling late Sunday on a school used as a shelter for displaced people had killed 15 people. The Israeli military said it was looking into the reports.
“The Al-Mufti school was bombarded with a large volley of Israeli artillery, resulting in an initial death toll of 15 martyrs, including children, women and entire families, and 50 wounded,” said its spokesman, Mahmud Bassal.
Regional tensions
With the wars in Lebanon and Gaza showing no sign of abating, fears of an all-out regional conflict have seen Iran, which backs Hezbollah and Hamas, engage in diplomatic efforts with allies and other powers.
Israel has vowed to retaliate against Iran’s missile strike of October 1, prompting a pledge from Tehran’s side that it would hit back if it is hit.
Iran has, for decades, financed and trained militant groups in Lebanon, the Palestinian territories and beyond, but it has yet to enter into direct conflict with its arch enemy, Israel.
On Sunday, Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian spoke with his French counterpart, Emmanuel Macron, to seek support for a Gaza and Lebanon ceasefire, according to the Iranian presidential website.
According to Macron’s office, the French leader appealed to Iran to support “a general de-escalation” in Lebanon and Gaza.
The Pentagon said it would deploy a high-altitude anti-missile system and its US military crew to Israel to help the ally protect itself from potential Iranian attack.


Second phase of polio vaccination campaign begins in Gaza, WHO says

Updated 14 October 2024
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Second phase of polio vaccination campaign begins in Gaza, WHO says

  • Aid groups carried out a first round of vaccinations last month

GENEVA: The World Health Organization said on X on Monday that the second phase of a polio vaccination campaign had started in central Gaza.
Aid groups carried out a first round of vaccinations last month, after a baby was partially paralyzed by the type 2 polio virus in August, in the first such case in the territory in 25 years.