BEIRUT, Lebanon â Israel said Friday that it killed the commander of Hezbollahâs elite unit in a strike that Lebanese officials said left 14 dead and dozens wounded in the movementâs Beirut stronghold.
Ibrahim Aqil, who was wanted by the United States for involvement in the 1983 bombing of the US embassy in Beirut, headed the Iran-backed militant groupâs elite Radwan Force.
Hezbollah confirmed late Friday that Aqil had been killed by Israeli fire, hailing him as âone of its great leadersâ.
AFP journalists at the scene said the blast left a massive crater and gutted the lower floors of a high-rise building in the Lebanese capitalâs southern suburbs.
Rescue workers were still using heavy equipment to search the rubble hours after the strike, AFPTV footage showed.
Aqilâs killing was the second of a senior Hezbollah commander since the start of the war in Gaza. An Israeli strike on Beirut in July killed Fuad Shukr, a top operations chief for the movement.
It also followed two waves of explosions, on Tuesday and Wednesday, of communication devices used by Hezbollah members, which Hezbollah blamed on Israel.
Those blasts killed dozens and left Hezbollah reeling while shifting the focus of the Israel-Hamas war northward.
Stephane Dujarric, spokesman for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, said the body was âvery concerned about the heightened escalationâ and called for âmaximum restraintâ from all sides.
The Israeli military said it conducted a âtargeted strikeâ against Aqil, which also killed around 10 other senior Radwan commanders.
A source close to Hezbollah said Aqil was âat a meeting with commandersâ when he was killed.
Lebanonâs health ministry said that the attack killed at least 14 people and wounded 66 more, and that it expected more bodies to be found.
The United States had offered a $7 million reward for information on Aqil, describing him as a âprincipal memberâ of an organisation that claimed the 1983 embassy bombing, which killed 63 people.
Spearhead
Israeli troops and Hezbollah fighters have battled each other along the Israel-Lebanon border since Hamas militants triggered the war in Gaza with their October 7 attack.
The focus of Israelâs firepower for nearly a year has been on Gaza, but with Hamas much weakened, the focus of the war has moved to Israelâs northern border.
Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said the countriesâ âenemiesâ would find no refuge, ânot even the Dahieh in Beirut,â a reference to the cityâs southern suburbs.
An Israeli military spokesman, Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, said after the strike that Israel was ânot aiming for a broad escalation in the regionâ.
But Hamas called it a âbrutal and terrorist aggressionâ and an âescalationâ.
Iranâs foreign ministry accused Israel of seeking to âbroaden the geography of the warâ.
Months of near-daily border clashes have killed hundreds in Lebanon, most of them fighters, and dozens in Israel, forcing tens of thousands on both sides to flee their homes.
The latest blow to Hezbollah came after thousands of Hezbollah operativesâ pagers and walkie-talkies exploded over two days, killing 37 people and wounding thousands more.
Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah vowed on Thursday that Israel would face retribution for those blasts.
Earlier Friday, Israel said Hezbollah had fired dozens of rockets from Lebanon following airstrikes that destroyed dozens of the militant groupâs launchers.
Speaking to troops on Wednesday, Gallant said âHezbollah will pay an increasing priceâ as Israel tries to âensure the safe returnâ of its citizens to border areas.
âWe are at the start of a new phase in the war,â he said.
Aqilâs Radwan Force spearheaded Hezbollahâs ground operations and Israel has repeatedly demanded through international mediators that its fighters be pushed away from the border.
âFear of wider warâ
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu delayed by a day his scheduled departure to the United States, where he is due to address the United Nations General Assembly.
On Friday the UNâs High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Turk, told the Security Council that the attack on Hezbollah communications devices violated international law and could constitute a war crime.
The pagers and walkie-talkies exploded as their users were shopping in supermarkets, walking on streets and attending funerals, plunging the country into panic.
âI am appalled by the breadth and impact of the attacks,â said Turk, adding that it âis a war crime to commit violence intended to spread terror among civiliansâ.
Earlier Friday, Hezbollah said it targeted at least six Israeli military bases with salvos of rockets after bombardments that people in south Lebanon described as among the fiercest so far.
Residents of Marjayoun, a Lebanese town close to the border, said the overnight bombardment was among the heaviest since the border clashes began last October.
âWe were very scared, especially for my grandchildren,â said Nuha Abdo, 62. âWe were moving them from one room to another.â
Clothing store owner Elie Rmeih, 45, counted more than 50 strikes.
âIt was a terrifying scene and unlike anything we have experienced since the escalation began,â he said. âWe live in fear of a wider war.â
International mediators, including the United States, have been scrambling to stop the Gaza war from turning into an all-out regional conflict.
Hamasâs October 7 attacks that sparked the Gaza war resulted in the deaths of 1,205 people, mostly civilians, on the Israeli side, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli official figures that include hostages killed in captivity.
Out of 251 hostages seized by militants, 97 are still held in Gaza, including 33 the Israeli military says are dead.
Israelâs retaliatory military offensive has killed at least 41,272 people in Gaza, most of them civilians, according to figures provided by the Hamas-run territoryâs health ministry. The United Nations has acknowledged the figures as reliable.