Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, said on October 8 that Safieddine had been “taken out” by the military without mentioning him by name.
In a hit in a southern Beirut neighborhood three weeks ago, Israel’s military has claimed that it “eliminated” Hashem Safieddine, the presumed successor of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah.
The army claimed in a statement that Hashem Safieddine, the chairman of Hezbollah’s Executive Council, and Ali Hussein Hazima, the director of Hezbollah’s Intelligence Directorate, were killed in an assault around three weeks ago together with other Hezbollah officers. Regarding the report, Hezbollah has not yet released a comment.
Benjamin Netanyahu, the prime minister of Israel, said earlier this month that Safieddine had been “taken out” by the military without mentioning him by name. Netanyahu said that Israeli troops “took out thousands of terrorists, including (Hezbollah leader Hassan) Nasrallah himself and Nasrallah’s replacement and the replacement of his replacement” during a speech to the people of Lebanon.
Hashem Safieddine, Head of the Hezbollah Executive Council and Ali Hussein Hazima, Commander of Hezbollah’s Intelligence Headquarters, were eliminated during a strike on Hezbollah’s main intelligence HQ in Dahieh approx. 3 weeks ago.
Hashem Safieddine was a member of the… pic.twitter.com/Z2wQGsRxvt
— Israel Defense Forces (@IDF) October 22, 2024
Israel’s air force “conducted a precise, intelligence-based strike on Hezbollah’s main intelligence headquarters” in the southern Beirut district of Dahiyeh, the Lebanese capital’s Hezbollah bastion, three weeks ago, the army said late Tuesday. More than 25 Hezbollah members, “including Bilal Saib Aish, who was in charge of aerial intelligence gathering,” were inside the headquarters during the bombing, the statement said.
According to a high-level Hezbollah source at the time, Safieddine, a distant cousin of Nasrallah and a member of Hezbollah’s decision-making council, had not spoken to anybody since Israeli bombings on Beirut weeks before. According to a number of sources, Safieddine, a very devout cleric with positive ties to Iran, a supporter of Hezbollah, was the “most likely” contender for the party’s top position.
Grey-bearded and bespectacled, Safieddine looked a lot like his distant cousin Nasrallah, but he was in his late 50s or early 60s, many years younger. Following the confirmation of Safieddine’s death, Israeli army commander Lieutenant General Herzi Halevi announced in a statement late Tuesday, “We have reached Nasrallah, his replacement, and most of Hezbollah’s senior leadership.”
After fighting the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas in Gaza for over a year, Israel turned its attention to Lebanon in late September, promising to protect its northern border from cross-border attacks by Hezbollah, Hamas’s Lebanese affiliate.
According to an AFP analysis of Lebanese health ministry data, Israel increased its airstrikes on Hezbollah strongholds around the nation and deployed ground forces late last month in a conflict that has claimed at least 1,552 lives since September 23. On Tuesday night, the Israeli military warned of impending assaults and issued further orders for citizens to leave parts of the southern suburbs of the city, Beirut.
