In just over a week, intensified Israeli strikes in Lebanon have killed seven commanders and high-ranking officials from the powerful Hezbollah militant group, including the group’s leader Hassan Nasrallah.
The move left Lebanon and most of the Middle East in shock while Israeli officials celebrated major military and intelligence breakthroughs.
Hezbollah opened a front to support its ally, Hamas, in the Gaza Strip, a day after the surprise attack launched by the Palestinian group on southern Israel.
The recent strikes in Lebanon and the assassination of Nasrallah mark a major escalation in the war in the Middle East, this time between Israel and Hezbollah.
Lebanon’s most powerful military and political force now finds itself trying to recover from the harsh blows, having lost key members who had been part of Hezbollah since its founding in the early 1980s.
Chief among them was Nasrallah, who was killed in a series of air strikes that flattened several buildings in southern Beirut. Others were less well known to the outside world, but were still essential to Hezbollah’s operations.
Hassan Nasrallah
Since 1992, Nasrallah has led the group through several wars with Israel, overseeing the party’s transformation into a powerful player in Lebanon. Hezbollah entered the political arena in Lebanon while also participating in regional conflicts that made it the most powerful paramilitary force. After the 2011 Syrian uprising turned into a civil war, Hezbollah played a pivotal role in keeping Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in power. Under Nasrallah, Hezbollah also helped develop the capabilities of Iranian-backed armed groups in Iraq and Yemen.
Nasrallah is a divisive figure in Lebanon, with his supporters praising him for ending the Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon in 2000, and his opponents criticizing him for the group’s stockpile of weapons and making unilateral decisions that they say serve the agenda of Tehran and its allies.
Nabil Qaouk
Qaouk, who was killed in an air strike on Saturday, was deputy head of Hezbollah’s Central Council. He joined the extremist group in its early days in the 1980s. Qaouk also served as Hezbollah’s military commander in southern Lebanon from 1995 until 2010. He made numerous media appearances and delivered speeches to his supporters, including at funerals of killed Hezbollah fighters. He was seen as a potential successor to Nasrallah.
Ibrahim Aqeel
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Aqeel was a senior commander and led Hezbollah’s Radwan forces, which Israel was trying to push away from its border with Lebanon. He was also a member of the highest military body, the Jihad Council, and for years was on the United States’ most wanted list. The US State Department says that Aqeel was part of the group that carried out the bombing of the US embassy in Beirut in 1983 and organized the process of taking German and American hostages.
Ahmed Wehbe
Wahbi was the leader of the Radwan Forces and played a decisive role in developing the group since its formation nearly two decades ago. He was killed alongside Aqeel in an air strike on the southern suburbs of Beirut that hit a building and leveled it.
Ali Karaki
Al-Karki led Hezbollah’s southern front, and played a major role in the ongoing conflict. The United States described him as an important figure in the leadership of the armed group. Little is known about Al-Karki, who was killed along with Nasrallah.
Muhammad Sorour
Sorour was the head of Hezbollah’s drone unit, which was used for the first time in the current conflict with Israel. Under his leadership, Hezbollah launched explosive and reconnaissance drones deep into Israel, penetrating its defense systems that mostly focused on the group’s rockets and missiles.
Ibrahim Qubaisi
Al-Qubaisi led Hezbollah’s missile unit. The Israeli army says that Al-Qubaisi planned to kidnap and kill three Israeli soldiers on the northern border in 2000, and their bodies were returned in a prisoner exchange deal with Hezbollah four years later.
Other senior commanders were killed in action
Even in the months before the latest escalation of the war with Hezbollah, the Israeli military targeted senior commanders, most notably Fouad Shukr in late July, hours before an explosion in Iran, widely blamed on Israel, that led to the death of the Hamas leader. Palestinian Ismail Haniyeh. . The United States accuses Fouad Shukr of masterminding the Beirut bombing in 1983, which killed 241 American soldiers.
The commanders of the main units in the south, Jawad al-Tawil, Talib Abdullah, and Muhammad Nasser, who over several decades became active members of Hezbollah’s military activity, were assassinated.
Who’s left?
Nasrallah’s second-in-command, Naim Qassem, is the organization’s most senior member. Qassem has been deputy leader of Hezbollah since 1991, and is among its founding members. On several occasions, local news networks were quick to assume that an Israeli raid in southern Beirut may have targeted Qassem.
Qasim is the only senior official in the armed group to have given interviews to local and international media in the ongoing conflict.
The deputy commander appears to be involved in various aspects of the armed group, both in senior political and security matters, but also in matters related to Hezbollah’s theocratic and charitable initiatives for the Shiite Muslim community in Lebanon.
Meanwhile, Hashem Safi al-Din, who heads Hezbollah’s Central Council, is expected to be Nasrallah’s successor. Safieddine is a cousin of the late Hezbollah leader, and his son is married to the daughter of Iranian General Qasem Soleimani, who was killed in a US drone strike in 2020. Like Nasrallah, Safieddine joined Hezbollah early and similarly wears a black turban. .
Talal Hamiyah and Abu Ali Reda are the two remaining senior Hezbollah commanders alive and appear to be in the crosshairs of the Israeli army.
& Edition 2024 The Canadian Press
