Israel says it has killed Hizbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah

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Israel’s military said on Saturday morning that it had killed Hizbollah’s leader Hassan Nasrallah in a massive strike on Beirut, in the latest in a string of devastating blows to the Lebanese militant group.

“Hassan Nasrallah . . . was eliminated by the Israel Defense Forces, together with Ali Karki, the commander of Hizbollah’s southern front, and additional Hizbollah commanders,” the Israeli military announced.

The strike capped a dramatic escalation by Israel in recent weeks, which has taken a heavy toll on Hizbollah’s capabilities and stoked fears that the year-long hostilities between the two sides are on the verge of erupting into an all-out war.

Nasrallah’s death — if confirmed by Hizbollah — would be by far the heaviest blow that the Iran-backed militant group has sustained.

Nasrallah’s role in the so-called axis of resistance of Iran-backed militant groups grew in significance after the US assassinated Qassem Soleimani, Iran’s most powerful commander, in 2020.

Nasrallah’s death would raise doubts about the future of Hizbollah, the Islamic revolutionary group created by Iran during the Lebanese civil war in the 1980s.

The cleric’s demise would also threaten to tip Lebanon into chaos. Having led Hizbollah since 1992, Nasrallah oversaw its rise to become the paramount political force in the country and a virtual state within a state.

He enjoyed vast authority in Lebanon and across the Middle East, where he had been compared with PLO leader Yasser Arafat and Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser in terms of his historical stature.

The strike which targeted Nasrallah came as part of an intense bombardment of sites across Lebanon which killed more than 600 people and displaced more than 90,000.

The attacks came after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Friday in a defiant speech at the UN in New York that Israel “must defeat” the Lebanese militant group, despite international pressure for a ceasefire.

That came after a massive two-week-long escalation by Israel, during which its forces assassinated a string of senior Hizbollah commanders.

Earlier this week, Israel called up two reserve brigades for “operational missions” in the north of the country, and Herzi Halevi, the head of the military, told troops to prepare for a possible ground offensive in Lebanon.

The Israeli military said it was continuing its bombardment on Saturday, carrying out “extensive” bombing raids in the Bekaa Valley in the east of the country as well as striking further targets in the capital, Beirut, after warning civilians in some densely populated neighbourhoods to evacuate.

This is a developing story . . .