Israel killed a top Hezbollah commander and other senior figures in the Lebanese movement in an airstrike on Beirut yesterday, vowing to press on with a new military campaign until it is able to secure the area around the Lebanese border.
The Israeli military and a security source in Lebanon says Ibrahim Aqil had been killed with other senior members of an elite Hezbollah unit in the airstrike, sharply escalating the year-long conflict between Israel and the Iran-backed group.
Hezbollah confirms Aqil's death in a statement just after midnight that called him "one of its top leaders," without providing details of how he died.
In a later statement summarising Aqil's biography, Hezbollah says he was killed in Beirut's southern suburbs of Dahiyeh in what it called a "treacherous Israeli assassination".
Lebanon's Health Ministry says at least 14 people died in the strike and the toll was expected to climb as rescue teams worked through the night.
[Source: Reuters]
