Hezbollah media chief killed in IDF strike on central Beirut

An Israeli airstrike on a building in a central neighborhood of the Lebanese capital Beirut on Sunday killed the top spokesman for the Hezbollah terror group.

Both the Israel Defense Forces and Hezbollah confirmed that media relations chief Mohammed Afif was killed in the strike on the Ras al-Naba’a neighborhood.

The IDF said in a statement said Afif “wielded significant influence over Hezbollah’s military operations” and “glorified and incited” attacks on Israel.

Unlike dozens of other Israeli attacks carried out in Beirut this past week, the strike killing Afif was not carried out in the southern suburbs of Beirut, a Hezbollah stronghold known as Dahiyeh, but rather nearer the center of the capital.

The building where Afif was targeted housed the offices of the Syrian Ba’ath Party, Hezbollah said. The IDF did not issue any evacuation warning before the strike, as it was an assassination and did not target Hezbollah’s infrastructure.

Afif had been especially visible after Israel’s military escalation in September and following the assassination of longtime Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, who was also killed in an Israeli airstrike.

Last month, Afif was forced to interrupt a press conference in Dahiyeh after the IDF’s Arabic language spokesman, Col. Avichay Adraee, issued an evacuation order for residents of the area ahead of an airstrike.

“The bombing does not scare us, nor the threats,” Afif said at the time. |Our will is firm and our determination is strong.”

Also on Sunday, the IDF said it had completed a wave of airstrikes against Hezbollah targets in Dahiyeh. The targets hit by fighter jets included command rooms and other infrastructure, according to the military.

Before those strikes were carried out, the IDF issued evacuation warnings to civilians in the area.

In recent days, the IDF has ramped up strikes against Hezbollah targets in Beirut with over 50 Hezbollah sites hit in the past week.

One of the targets struck by Israeli fighter jets in Beirut on Saturday was an apartment formerly belonging to Nasrallah, according to the IDF.

The military said Nasrallah was targeted at the home during the 2006 Second Lebanon War, and it was later rebuilt. The apartment was currently being used by Hezbollah for its activities, the IDF said.

Lebanon said late Sunday that strikes in Tyre, a Hezbollah stronghold in the south of the country, had killed 11 people and injured 48 others.

Sunday’s strikes came after a barrage of some 20 rockets was launched from Lebanon at the Western Galilee and Haifa Bay area in the morning.

According to the IDF, some of the rockets were intercepted by air defenses, while the rest struck open areas, causing no injuries.

The IDF also released footage on Sunday showing a Hezbollah weapons cache and tunnel being demolished by combat engineers in southern Lebanon.

The site had been discovered by troops of the Kfir Brigade’s Haruv reconnaissance unit, who are operating in Lebanon under the Alon Reserve Brigade. It marked the first time in the unit’s history that it was operating in Lebanon.

According to the IDF, during a raid in a southern Lebanon village, the troops found a tunnel shaft that led to underground infrastructure. Next to the shaft was a weapons depot, ammunition and a motorcycle, which the IDF says “were prepared for an invasion” of Israel.

Three IDF divisions have been operating in southern Lebanon in recent days, as the military has expanded its offensive against Hezbollah.

On Saturday, Hezbollah claimed to have confronted IDF soldiers on the outskirts of Shama, a Lebanese village located some 5 kilometers (3.1 miles) from the border with Israel.

It would mark the deepest point in Lebanon that the IDF has reached during the ongoing ground offensive.

Meanwhile, the IDF reportedly removed roadblocks on the northern border which were set up to prevent civilians from driving on roads that were exposed to anti-tank missile fire from Lebanon.

According to a Sunday morning report by Army Radio, all of the military roadblocks on the Lebanon border were removed in recent days, ahead of a possible return of the displaced residents of the north to their homes.

“The reality in the north has changed,” IDF officials were cited by the radio station as saying.

“There are no longer places where you can’t drive. Bypass roads are no longer needed, and citizens can also drive on these roads,” the officials were cited as saying, adding that this freedom of movement is due to the IDF having taken control of key areas in south Lebanon, thereby reducing the threat.

Some 60,000 residents were evacuated from northern Israeli towns on the Lebanon border shortly after fellow terror group Hamas’s October 7, 2023, onslaught in southern Israel, amid fears Hezbollah would carry out a similar attack, and increasing rocket fire by the Lebanese terror group.

For months since October 8, 2023, Hezbollah-led forces attacked Israeli communities and military posts along the border on a near-daily basis, with the group saying it is doing so to support Gaza amid the war there.

Hezbollah has since expanded its attacks to also target cities in central and northern Israel with rockets, in addition to the attacks on the border, though in recent days the IDF has seen a decrease in the number of attacks.

The attacks on northern Israel have resulted in the deaths of 43 civilians. In addition, 70 IDF soldiers and reservists have died in cross-border skirmishes and in the ensuing ground operation launched in southern Lebanon in late September. Two soldiers have been killed in a drone attack from Iraq, and there have also been several attacks from Syria, without any injuries.

The IDF estimates that some 3,000 Hezbollah operatives have been killed in the conflict. Around 100 members of other terror groups, along with hundreds of civilians, have also been reported killed in Lebanon.

Meanwhile, on Sunday morning, the IDF also said a drone launched at Israel “from the east” — usually code for Iraq — was intercepted by air defenses over southern Israel.

Footage posted to social media showed a cloud of smoke above a Bezeq antenna farm near Rehovot, apparently following the interception of the drone.

There were no reports of injuries. Shrapnel from the interception sparked a small fire in the area.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the drone.

Source » timesofisrael.com