Hezbollah suffers heaviest blow in years as commander is shot dead in Beirut

 

 

Shia militia blames Israel for killing Hassan Howlo al-Laqqis, but responsibility is claimed by previously unknown Sunni group..

A senior Hezbollah commander has been shot dead outside his south Beirut apartment in the biggest blow to the secretive Shia militia since its then military commander was assassinated by a car bomb in the city six years ago. Hezbollah blamed Israel for the killing, saying it had twice before tried and failed to target Hassan Howlo al-Laqqis, who is understood to have been the group's overall logistics and procurement chief.

 

But a previously unknown Sunni group claimed responsibility for the brazen attack on Hezbollah's home turf, underlining the Shia militia's deepening entanglement in a regional sectarian conflict.

Before Laqqis's funeral in Hezbollah's Beeka valley heartland, a statement from the militant group said Israel "should bear full responsibility and all the consequences of this heinous crime and its repeated targeting of dear resistance leaders and cadres".

 

Israeli officials denied any involvement. "Unequivocally no. We had nothing to do with it," said Israel's energy minister, Silvan Shalom. "The Salafists over there did it," he added, referring to a fundamentalist Sunni insurgency in Syria and Lebanon that has in recent months vowed to take the fight to the Shia Hezbollah. An unknown group claiming to represent Lebanese Sunni interests took to Twitter to claim responsibility for the killing. In late November, another Sunni group, the Abdullah Azzam Brigades, used the same forum to claim it had sent two suicide bombers to blow up the Iranian embassy in Beirut, an attack that killed more than 20 people, including a diplomat and up to four Hezbollah guards.

 

Renowned for its secrecy and discipline, Hezbollah closely guards its inner secrets, particularly its military command structure and the identities of senior militants who lead operations against Israel and, increasingly, against groups fighting the regime of its key backer, Syria's president, Bashar al-Assad.