Israelis cheer death of arch-enemy Hassan Nasrallah

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Israel’s leaders cheered the assassination of arch enemy Hassan Nasrallah as a historic victory, relishing the success of an attack that came after one of the darkest periods in Israeli history.

Hizbollah’s leader in Beirut had been hunted by Israeli intelligence for decades. His killing was described on Saturday by defence minister Yoav Gallant as a “long-standing reckoning” and “one of the most important assassinations in the history of the State of Israel”.

The assault on Nasrallah came as Israel prepares to mark the anniversary of Hamas’s October 7 attack, which killed about 1,200 people and was one of the nation’s biggest intelligence failures since it was founded in 1948.

In the year since, Israeli forces have been fighting a grinding war against Hamas in Gaza, severely depleting, but not destroying, the Palestinian group. Israel’s conduct of the offensive in the besieged strip has drawn widespread international criticism; more than 40,000 people have been killed, according to Palestinian health officials.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has also come under mounting pressure at home to reach a deal to free Israeli hostages still held by Hamas. The militant group’s leader Yahya Sinwar, the mastermind of the October 7 attack, remains at large, believed to be hiding out in Hamas’s vast network of tunnels in Gaza.

But on Saturday, Israeli politicians cheered their military’s “brilliant planning and execution” of the assassination of Nasrallah, one of the most powerful figures in Iran’s so-called axis of resistance.

“The elimination of arch-terrorist Nasrallah is one of the most justified counterterrorism actions Israel has ever taken. I commend Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for initiating this bold action,” foreign minister Israel Katz said.

Gallant said the operation would deter Israel’s enemies in future.

“This assassination joins the sequence of recent actions echoing all over the Middle East,” Gallant said. It sends a message, he said, that those who target Israel “will pay a very heavy price”.

The Israeli military published a video of its F15i jets taking off from Hatzerim air base in the Negev desert in southern Israel, heading for Beirut to conduct the strike. It also shared what it said were radio communications between an air force Major General and the pilots shortly after the strike.

“You’ve delivered a show of victory here, I believe,” Major General Tomer Bar, commanding officer of the Israeli Air Force, can be heard saying in the clip distributed to journalists. “Well done. Immense pride.” An unnamed pilot responds: “We will reach everyone, everywhere.”

Many Israelis welcomed the news. In a video from a resort in the seaside town of Eilat, beachgoers can be seen clapping as a loudspeaker announces Nasrallah’s death. Memes mocking Nasrallah spread across social media.

Israel’s army chiefs said the operation against Hizbollah was not over yet, and suggested the country’s goals may have grown.

Previously, Israel’s week-long bombardment of southern Lebanon and Beirut had been described by officials as an attempt to destroy Hizbollah weapons stores and force the group to comply with a long-ignored UN resolution to retreat far from the border with Israel.

Netanyahu has pledged to secure Israel’s northern border region to allow more than 60,000 people displaced by Hizbollah’s rocket fire to return home.

Military leaders said they would maintain the assault on Hizbollah; the military said it killed another of the group’s commanders in a strike in Beirut on Saturday.

“We have more missions ahead on all fronts,” Israeli army chief Lieutenant General Herzi Halevi said, vowing to “continue destroying the Hizbollah terrorist organisation and to keep fighting”.

He added that he had just toured the army’s northern command and “approved plans” for its next steps. “Challenging days await,” he said.