Hezbollah leaders gathered for the funeral of a terrorist commander who was killed in an Israeli airstrike in Beirut on Friday.
The funeral of Ibrahim Aqil, head of Hezbollah’s military operations and acting commander of the Radwan Force, took place on Sunday after he was killed in an explosion that is said to have killed 37 people, including three children and 15 other commanders.
Images from the procession, which took place in the southern Beirut suburb of Dahieh, showed hundreds of mourners, many of them wearing military uniforms and carrying the flag of the Iranian-backed militant group. The funeral of Hezbollah member Mahmoud Hamad was taking place at the same time.
Supporters could be seen carrying the slain leader’s photo as well as Palestinian, Iranian and Lebanese flags, while a song about “being martyred on the road to Jerusalem” played in the background.
An Israel Defense Forces statement said Aqil, who was in his 60s, was killed along with other Radwan commanders during a meeting held in an underground bunker.
The funeral of Ibrahim Aqil, head of Hezbollah’s military operations and acting commander of the Radwan Force, was held on Sunday.
Hezbollah members salute near the coffin of Hezbollah commander Ibrahim Akil during the funeral procession in the southern suburb of Beirut
The United States has received confirmation of the death of Ibrahim Aqil (pictured), saying that “no one sheds a tear” for the terrorist group’s second-in-command and leader of its Radwan special forces.
Mourners gather during the funeral of Hezbollah leader Ibrahim Aqil, who was killed in Friday’s Israeli attack in the southern suburbs of Beirut.
Supporters held up Hezbollah flags and photos of Akil (left) and Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei (right) during Akil’s funeral procession.
Aqil was initially injured in the pager blasts on Tuesday and had been released from hospital on Friday, before he died in Friday’s attack.
On Tuesday and Wednesday of this week, pagers and walkie-talkies used by Hezbollah members exploded simultaneously, killing 39 people and injuring thousands in Lebanon.
That was before an airstrike killed Aqil and other Hezbollah members, along with 32 civilians, on Friday.
Israel has only claimed responsibility for the airstrike, but earlier today Israeli President Isaac Herzog denied any involvement in the pager attacks.
Speaking on Sky News on Sunday morning, Herzog warned that Israel is in a “dangerous situation” and that there is “clearly the potential for a dramatic escalation”.
Israel had not commented on its involvement in the deadly attacks until this morning, when the president said he “flatly rejects any connection to this or that source of operation.”
“There are many enemies of Hezbollah, and these days there are many. Hezbollah has been suffocating Lebanon, destroying it, creating havoc in Lebanon again and again. We are here simply to defend ourselves. That’s all we do,” he added.
Aqil, the career terrorist and close confidant of Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah, had a £5m bounty on him for his role in the 1983 bombing of the US embassy in Beirut that killed 63 people.
He was also involved in the twin bomb attacks on the US Marine barracks in Lebanon the same year, which killed 241 US personnel and 307 people in total.
Aqil was initially injured in the pager blasts on Tuesday and had been released from hospital on Friday, before he died in Friday’s attack.
Naim Qassem (right), deputy secretary general of Hezbollah, and Mohammed Raad (center), head of Hezbollah’s bloc in the Lebanese parliament, attend Aqil’s funeral
Qassem leads funeral prayers during the funeral of Aqil and Hezbollah member Mahmoud Hamad
A man gestures at the funeral of Hezbollah leader Ibrahim Aqil
Mourners carry a coffin during the funeral of Hezbollah leader Ibrahim Aqil and Hezbollah member Mahmoud Hamad
Hezbollah members killed in Israeli strikes. The airstrike has “almost completely dismantled” the group’s military chain of command, according to the Israeli army.
In a statement delivered at the Israeli-American Council conference in Washington, US Middle East czar Brett McGurk said: “Ibrahim Aqil was responsible for the Beirut embassy bombing 40 years ago, so no one sheds a tear for him.”
During Aqil’s funeral, Hezbollah deputy leader Naim Qassem, who was seen sitting in the front row during the funeral, said the force had entered a new phase of its battle against Israel, warning: “But just as we are in pain, you will also be in pain.”
Qassem vowed that the current conflict would destroy Israel’s economy and told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that he would not achieve his goals.
The deputy leader said Hezbollah, which has lost several senior military leaders in recent months, “has come back stronger and the frontline will witness this.”
Qassem described Aqil as an operations commander who founded the Radwan Unit, stressing that he was a martyr of Jerusalem and Palestine.
He stressed that “Israel’s attack on Radwan leaders was aimed at paralyzing the resistance and inciting hostility within their entourage, seeking to stop support for Gaza and the return of residents from the north.”
Hezbollah described him as one of its “great jihadist leaders.”
The funeral comes after Israel and Lebanon exchanged heavy fire overnight as the IDF vowed to step up its attacks on Hezbollah targets.
Some of the shells were intercepted and fallen shells were located in Kiryat Bialik, Tsur Shalom and Moreshet, causing fires in the area, the Israeli military said.
Israeli President Isaac Herzog denied any Israeli involvement in this week’s explosive pager and walkie-talkie attacks on Sky News on Sunday and said the country has no interest in being at war with Lebanon.
Medical staff move a patient’s bed into an underground emergency hospital in a parking lot of the Rambam Healthcare Campus, amid cross-border hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel, in Haifa, Israel, September 22, 2024
The Israeli military said it struck around 290 targets on Saturday, including thousands of Hezbollah rocket-propelled guns, and the country closed its schools and restricted gatherings in many areas of the north of the country early on Sunday.
Dozens of fighter jets began “extensively” attacking southern Lebanon “after detecting that Hezbollah was preparing to fire towards Israeli territory,” said IDF spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari.
Before the Israeli strikes began in the afternoon, the IDF had earlier said it had destroyed “around 180 sites and thousands of rocket launcher barrels” with strikes.
The Israeli military said more than 100 shells were fired from Lebanon early Sunday, adding that fire services were working to put out fires sparked by falling ammunition.
Israeli media reported that several buildings were hit directly or by falling missile debris, and ambulance services said they treated some people for minor injuries; no serious casualties were reported.
Hezbollah said it attacked Israel’s Ramat David airbase with dozens of missiles in response to “repeated Israeli attacks on Lebanon,” the group posted on its Telegram channel early Sunday.
