Israel’s army confirmed on Tuesday that it “eliminated” Hezbollah’s Hashem Safieddine, the apparent successor of the slain leader Hassan Nasrallah in a strike that occurred in a southern Beirut suburb three weeks ago,
“It can now be confirmed that in an attack approximately three weeks ago, Hashem Safieddine, the head of Hezbollah’s Executive Council, and Ali Hussein Hazima, the head of Hezbollah’s Intelligence Directorate, were killed along with other Hezbollah commanders,” the military reported in a statement.
Hezbollah has not yet released a statement concerning the assertion.
On October 8, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu informed the public that the military had “taken out” Safieddine, without providing any specific information.
Israeli forces “killed thousands of terrorists, including (Hezbollah leader Hassan) Nasrallah himself, Nasrallah’s replacement, and the replacement of his replacement,” Netanyahu stated in an address to the people of Lebanon.
The army announced late on Tuesday that Israel’s air force conducted a “precision, intelligence-based strike on Hezbollah’s main intelligence headquarters” in the southern Beirut suburb of Dahiyeh, which was Hezbollah’s stronghold in the Lebanese capital three weeks ago.
The statement further stated that the headquarters was occupied by more than 25 Hezbollah militants during the strike, “including Bilal Saib Aish, who was responsible for aerial intelligence gathering.”
Safieddine, a distant relative of Nasrallah and a member of Hezbollah’s decision-making body, was reported to have been out of contact since the Israeli strikes on Beirut several weeks ago by a high-ranking Hezbollah source.
In early October, a source with a close connection to Hezbollah informed AFP that the “most probable” candidate for the party’s highest position was the deeply religious cleric Safieddine, who maintained cordial relations with Hezbollah’s ally, Iran.
Safieddine, who was in his late 50s or early 60s, was several years younger than his distant cousin Nasrallah, and he was bespectacled and grey-bearded.
Lieutenant General Herzi Halevi, the Israeli army’s chief, issued a statement late on Tuesday following the confirmation of Safieddine’s death, stating, “We have reached Nasrallah, his replacement, and the majority of Hezbollah’s senior leadership.”
