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‘Eliminated’: Israel says it killed Hezbollah chief of staff Haytham Tabatabai in strike in Beirut
Lebanon's health ministry said that five people were killed in the strike and 28 were wounded.
Israel on Sunday said it has killed senior Hezbollah militant Haytham Tabtabai in a strike on Beirut.
According to AFP, the strike occurred in the densely populated Haret Hreik neighbourhood in Beirut's southern suburbs.
Lebanon's health ministry said that five people were killed in the strike and 28 were wounded. It did not give the identities of the people killed.
“ELIMINATED: Haytham Ali Tabatabai, Hezbollah’s Chief of General Staff, in the Beirut area,” the Israel Defense Forces wrote in a post on X.
“Tabatabai, a veteran operative since the 1980s, commanded the Radwan Force, led Hezbollah operations in Syria, and entrenched its operational and combat capabilities,” the IDF added.
An AFP correspondent at the scene reported that the strike targeted the third and fourth floors of a nine-storey building. Lebanon's official National News Agency stated that three missiles were launched at the building.
‘Crossed a new red line’
On its part, Hezbollah confirmed that a senior commander was targeted in the strike, and said that Sunday's attack by Israel "crosses a new red line".
"The targeting was clearly aimed at a key... figure in the resistance, and the results are unknown," Hezbollah official Mahmud Qomati told reporters.
Israel has carried out regular strikes in Lebanon since the November 2024 ceasefire that sought to end more than a year of hostilities with Hezbollah, saying it is striking members of the group or its infrastructure in the country's south and east.
According to the AP, the United States had designated Tabtabai as a terrorist in 2016, calling him a military leader who led Hezbollah’s special forces in Syria and Yemen, and it offered up to $5 million for information about him..
Sunday's strike also comes days before Pope Leo XIV is scheduled to visit Lebanon on his first foreign trip.
