Israel Defense Forces (IDF) targeted Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah in a strike on the Iranian-backed terror group's main headquarters in Beirut on Friday night, The Jerusalem Post reported, citing an Israeli official.
Israeli officials suspected that Nasrallah was in the bunker targeted in the bombing, and that anyone inside would struggle to survive such an attack. Reuters reported a source close to Hezbollah said he is alive after the strike, which hit Beirut's southern suburbs. Hezbollah has not commented officially on the attack.
Hezbollah has been barraging northern Israel almost daily with rockets and missiles since the Jewish state began its military response in the Gaza Strip to Iranian-backed Hamas' Oct. 7 terror attack. Hezbollah is believed to have been behind a rocket attack on a soccer field in the Golan Heights in July that killed 12 Israeli children and injured 44 others.
Friday's strike also occurred a week after an Israeli airstrike on a residential area in Beirut killed two top Hezbollah military commanders, including Ibrahim Aqil, believed to be behind the bombings of a U.S. Marines barracks and the U.S. embassy in Lebanon in 1983. The attack that killed Aqil happened just days after a wave of explosions of pagers and walkie-talkies used by the group killed dozens and wounded thousands. Israel is believed to have been responsible for those attacks but has not claimed responsibility.
About three hours before Friday's strike, Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who gave a defiant speech in front of the U.N. General Assembly in New York on Friday morning, consulted with Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi, the Post reported. Netanyahu cut his trip to New York short and planned to leave for Israel on Friday night.
At least two people have been killed and 76 wounded, The New York Times reported, citing Lebanon's health ministry. Lebanon Health Minister Firass Abiad said the toll was likely to rise. He said the strikes caused the "complete decimation" of four to six residential buildings, and that the number of casualties in hospitals was low because most people were still trapped.
"They are residential buildings. They were filled with people," Abiad said, according to the Times. "Whoever is in those buildings is now under the rubble."
According to Israeli sources, Israel informed the U.S. of the strike shortly before it happened, and Netanyahu authorized the strike from New York, the Post reported.
But Pentagon deputy press secretary Sabrina Singh said during a briefing Friday that "we were not given an advanced warning of this operation." She said Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin spoke with his Israeli counterpart as the operation was ongoing. President Joe Biden also reportedly said he did not have advanced knowledge of the strike.
"After almost a year of Hezbollah firing rockets, missiles, and suicide drones at Israeli civilians, after almost a year of Israel warning the world and telling them that Hezbollah must be stopped, Israel is doing what every sovereign state in the world would do if they had a terror organization that seeks their destruction on their border, taking the necessary action to protect our people so that Israeli families can live in their homes, safely and securely," IDF spokesman Daniel Hagari said, according to the Post.
In response, the Iranian embassy in Beirut released a statement on X calling the attack "a bloody massacre," adding that it represented "a serious escalation that changes the rules of the game," and that "its perpetrator will be punished appropriately and disciplined."
Michael Katz ✉
Michael Katz is a Newsmax reporter with more than 30 years of experience reporting and editing on news, culture, and politics.
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