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TEHRAN – Hezbollah announced on Wednesday that Sayyed Hashem Safieddine, the head of the Lebanese resistance movement\u2019s Executive Council, was martyred in an Israeli airstrike on Beirut earlier this month.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe pledge to our great martyr and his martyred brothers to continue the path of resistance and jihad (struggle) until achieving its goals of freedom and victory,\u201d Hezbollah said in a statement.<\/p>\n
The Israeli army said on Tuesday that Safieddine was killed during a strike on October 4.<\/p>\n
Safieddine was widely expected to be formally elected as the next Hezbollah leader after Israel assassinated Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah last month.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Israel killed Nasrallah, who was the movement\u2019s chief since 1992, in an airstrike on a neighborhood in southern Beirut on September 27.<\/p>\n
US media acknowledged that Israel used American-made 900kg (2,000-pound) bombs in the strike that killed Nasrallah and levelled residential buildings in Beirut\u2019s suburb of Dahieh.<\/p>\n
Israel has killed multiple Hezbollah commanders amid the exchanges of fire with the resistance group since October 8, 2023. That is a day after Israel launched its war of genocide in Gaza. Hezbollah has carried out attacks against Israel in a show of solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza.<\/p>\n
Israel also launched a massive bombing campaign in Lebanon on September 23 this year and launched a ground incursion into southern Lebanon on October 1.<\/p>\n
Israel has killed about 2,500 people in Lebanon since October last year, including 1,800 in the past few weeks.<\/p>\n
In response to Israel\u2019s attacks, Hezbollah has intensified its retaliatory operations targeting strategic military sites in Tel Aviv and Haifa.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
The resistance movement\u2019s reprisal strikes have spread a growing sense of panic among Israelis keeping the regime on its toes.\u00a0<\/p>\n
******Israel\u2019s illusions<\/p>\n
Israel is under the illusion that its war on Lebanon along with the assassination of Hezbollah\u2019s leaders and commanders will bring the movement to its knees.<\/p>\n
But Israel\u2019s previous wars on Lebanon clearly illustrated that the regime is unable to weaken Hezbollah.<\/p>\n
Hezbollah dealt a major blow to Israel after ending the regime\u2019s nearly 20-year occupation of Lebanon.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Israel launched an offensive in Lebanon in 1982, sending its tanks all the way to Beirut. It occupied southern Lebanon until it was driven out by Hezbollah in 2000.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Israel carried out the assault after coming under attack from Palestinians in Lebanon.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Sporadic clashes between Israel and Hezbollah continued even after it was forced to leave southern Lebanon.<\/p>\n
From hubris to humiliation\u00a0 \u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n Tensions boiled over in 2006 when Israel went to war with Hezbollah in southern Lebanon.<\/p>\n The war started on July 12, 2006 \u2013 days after the Lebanese resistance movement\u00a0captured two Israeli soldiers.\u00a0<\/p>\n The conflict ended in mid-August after Israel, which had displayed a lot hubris, failed to defeat Hezbollah.<\/p>\n Israel killed more than 1,000 Lebanese, mostly civilians in the 34-day conflict. \u00a0<\/p>\n Israel lost more than 120 soldiers in the 34-day war.\u00a0<\/p>\n Before his martyrdom, Nasrallah had said on multiple occasions that the 2006 war, known as the July War, was a success for the resistance movement.\u00a0<\/p>\n In August 2021, an Israeli inquiry acknowledged the regime\u2019s failure to achieve its goal in the 2006 war, describing the conflict as \u201cunsuccessful\u201d and \u201cmissed opportunity\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cIsrael initiated a long war, which ended without its clear military victory,\u201d the inquiry found.<\/p>\n Hezbollah\u2019s military power \u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n The military capability of the Lebanese resistance movement has grown since then.\u00a0<\/p>\n Hezbollah\u2019s martyred chief, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, had said that the resistance movement has 100,000 fighters.<\/p>\n Hezbollah has also increased its stockpile of missiles from 14,000 in 2006 to about 150,000 and has developed precision-guided missiles\u00a0and its drone programs.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n