Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah was killed in an Israeli airstrike

A statement said Nasrallah had “joined his fellow martyrs”. Hezbollah vowed to “continue the holy war against the enemy and in support of Palestine.”

Nasrallah, who led Hezbollah for more than three decades, is by far the most powerful target to be killed by Israel in weeks of intense fighting with Hezbollah. The Israeli military said it carried out a precision airstrike on Friday as Hezbollah’s leadership was meeting at their headquarters in Dahiyeh, south of Beirut.

Lebanon’s health ministry said six people were killed and 91 wounded in the strikes, which devastated six blocks of flats. Ali Karki, commander of Hezbollah’s Southern Front, and other commanders were also killed, the Israeli military said.

Iran announced on Saturday that a prominent general in the US-sanctioned paramilitary Revolutionary Guard had died in the same airstrike. Abbas Nilforushan, 58, whom the US identified as the deputy commander for Guard operations, was killed on Friday, the state-run IRNA news agency reported.

Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani, an Israeli military spokesman, said the airstrike was based on years of tracking Nasrallah along with “real-time information” that made him viable. He declined to say what munitions were used in the attack or give an estimate of civilian deaths, saying only that Israel takes steps to avoid civilians whenever possible.

The Palestinian militant group Hamas sent its condolences to its ally Hezbollah in a statement. Nasrallah has frequently described the rocket fire against northern Israel as a “support front” for Hamas and the Palestinians in Gaza.

It said that “the assassinations will only increase the resistance in Lebanon and Palestine in determination and determination.”

Immediately after Hezbollah’s confirmation, people began shooting in the air in Beirut and other areas of the country to mourn Nasrallah’s death. “I wish it had been our children, not you, Sayyid!” said one woman, using an honorific for Nasrallah, as she held her child in her arms in the western city of Baabda.

News of Nasrallah’s killing sent shockwaves through Lebanon’s only international airport, where hundreds of Lebanese were scrambling to leave the country despite limited flights. Some passengers were in tears. Others were on the phone with disbelieving relatives. A woman screamed into the phone, “No! It was just an announcement! No, he’s not dead!”

Israel vows to continue attacks against Hezbollah

Israel’s chief of staff, Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi, said Saturday that Nasrallah’s removal “was not the end of our toolbox,” indicating that more strikes were planned. Defense Minister Yoav Gallant called it “the most significant targeted strike since the establishment of the State of Israel.”

Israel has vowed to step up pressure on Hezbollah until it halts its attacks that have displaced tens of thousands of Israelis from communities near the border with Lebanon. Recent fighting has also displaced more than 200,000 Lebanese in the past week, according to the United Nations.

The army said on Saturday it was mobilizing more reservists as tensions rise with Lebanon, activating three battalions of reservists to serve across the country. It sent two brigades to northern Israel earlier this week to train for a possible ground invasion.

Shoshani, the army spokesman, said Israel had inflicted heavy damage on Hezbollah’s capabilities over the past week by targeting a combination of immediate threats and strategic weapons such as larger, guided missiles. But he said much of Hezbollah’s arsenal still remained intact and that Israel would continue to target the group.

The Israeli military updated guidelines for Israeli citizens, canceling gatherings of more than 1,000 people due to the ongoing threat.

About 60,000 Israelis have been evacuated from their homes along the border with Lebanon for nearly a year. Earlier this month, the Israeli government said halting Hezbollah attacks in the country’s north to allow residents to return to their homes was an official war objective.

A year of hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah

Hezbollah began firing rockets into Israel in support of Gaza on October 8, a day after Hamas militants launched an unprecedented attack on Israel, killing about 1,200 people and kidnapping another 250. Since then, the two sides have been engaged in cross-border attacks. which gradually escalated and displaced tens of thousands of civilians on both sides of the border.

Hostilities escalated dramatically last week when thousands of explosives hidden in pagers and walkie-talkies used by Hezbollah detonated, killing dozens of people and leaving thousands, including many civilians, with serious eye, face and limb injuries. Israel is believed to be behind the attack. Israel has also killed several top Hezbollah commanders in Beirut, particularly in the past two weeks, in addition to the attack that killed Nasrallah.

A window of opportunity for Israel, Lebanon

Orna Mizrahi, a senior fellow at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv and a former intelligence analyst for the Israeli military and the prime minister’s office, noted that Nasrallah was at times a “voice of reason” interested in drawing Israel into a war of attrition and preventing the militant group from using the full force of their formidable arsenal against Israel.

Nasrallah’s death could prompt some less senior members of Hezbollah to unleash far more powerful weapons than have been used in the nearly year-long exchange of hostilities between Hezbollah and Lebanon, she said. Still, the biggest question mark right now is how Iran will respond, Mizrahi said.

She added that Nasrallah’s death could provide a window of opportunity, while the organization is significantly weakened, for Lebanon to dilute Hezbollah’s far-reaching influence, particularly in the south, which threatens to drag Lebanon into a full-scale war. wide with Israel.

Strikes continue on both sides of the border

On Saturday morning, the Israeli military carried out more than 140 airstrikes in southern Beirut and the Bekaa valley in eastern Lebanon, including targeting an anti-ship missile storage facility in the Beirut suburb of Dahiyeh. Israel said the missiles were stored underground under civilian apartment buildings. Hezbollah fired dozens of projectiles into northern and central Israel and deep into the Israeli-occupied West Bank, destroying some buildings in the northern city of Safed.

In Beirut’s southern suburbs, smoke rose and streets remained empty after the area was hit overnight by heavy Israeli airstrikes. Shelters set up in the city center for displaced people were full. Many families slept in public squares and beaches or in their cars. On the roads leading to the mountains above the capital, hundreds of people could be seen making an exodus on foot, clutching babies and whatever belongings they could carry.

A total of 1,030 people – including 156 women and 87 children – have been killed in Israeli attacks in Lebanon in less than two weeks, the country’s health minister announced on Saturday.