The body of top Hezbollah commander Fuad Shukr was recovered from the rubble of an Israeli attack on southern Beirut on Wednesday, a source close to Hezbollah said, raising fears of a wider war.
According to Lebanon’s Health Ministry, five civilians were killed – including three women and two children – in the attack on a Beirut suburb that is a crowded residential area and a Hezbollah stronghold.
Another attack came hours later, killing Ismail Haniyeh, the political leader of Hezbollah’s ally Hamas in Tehran, raising fears that the Gaza war could spread further.
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres condemned both attacks, saying it was a “dangerous escalation at a time when all efforts must lead to a ceasefire in Gaza” and “the release of all Israeli hostages,” his spokesman Stephane Dujarric said in a statement.
“Even if those involved do not intend to start a full-blown war, every time tensions escalate, the risk of the situation spiraling out of control increases,” Lina Khatib, an associate fellow at Chatham House and a Middle East expert, told AFP.
The source, who requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter, said “Shukra’s body was found under the rubble of the targeted building,” while the Israeli military said on Tuesday it had killed the commander.
AFP photographers saw rescue workers searching through rubble shortly after explosions rocked the Lebanese capital on Tuesday evening.
The Israeli military said its strike had “eliminated” Shukr, who was accused of carrying out a rocket attack on the Golan Heights over the weekend that killed 12 children in a Druze Arab town.
Hezbollah has denied responsibility for Saturday’s deadly rocket attack on the Druze Arab town of Majdal Shams in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, though the Iran-backed group claimed multiple attacks on Israeli military targets that day.
The Israeli military has described Shukar as Hezbollah’s “most senior military commander” and the “right-hand man” of the group’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah.
Army chief Herzi Halevi said on Wednesday that Israel “will not allow a return to the situation of Hezbollah’s presence on the border” where there is almost daily exchange of fire between the group and Israel.
Prior to the attack, Hezbollah had evacuated some of its bases in southern and eastern Lebanon, fearing an Israeli retaliatory strike.
‘I could lose my children’
Earlier on Wednesday, Hezbollah confirmed that Shukar was inside the targeted building, but his fate is still unknown.
Hezbollah said in a statement that “the great jihadist commander brother Fuad Shukr (Haj Mohsen) was present in the targeted building”, where rescue teams were “working to remove the rubble… and we are still waiting for the results of this operation regarding the fate of the great commander”.
On Wednesday, hundreds of mourners chanted “Death to Israel” and “America is the Great Satan” at the funeral of two children killed in the raid, Amira and Hassan Fadlallah.
Some people at the march in southern Beirut carried photographs of the two dead siblings, while others carried Hezbollah flags.
“I’m very angry because … our children’s lives are becoming very cheap,” said Aya Ahmed, 38, a friend of the mother of the two killed.
“Now every mother is thinking I can lose my children at any moment because the Israelis have a license to kill,” Ahmed said.
In 2017, the US Treasury offered $5 million for information on Shukr, a man in his sixties, describing him as a “senior adviser” to Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah.
He had a “central role” in the deadly 1983 bombing of a U.S. Marine Corps barracks in Beirut, the Treasury said.
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