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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

IDF says senior Hezbollah air defense operative killed in southern Lebanon airstrike

2026-02-03

[IsraelTimes] Military also reports killing a second Hezbollah operative in a separate strike, hitting weapons depots in the towns of Kfar Tebnit and Ain Qana

An ~~Arclight~~ airstrike
...KABOOM!...
in the southern Leb
Leb

...Formerly inhabited by hardy Phoenecian traders, its official language is now Arabic, with the usual unpleasant side effects....
town of Harouf on Sunday killed a senior Hezbollah air defense operative, the Israel Defense Forces announced on Monday, adding that a separate strike that morning had killed a different member of the terror group.

The later strike killed Ali al-Hadi Mustafa al-Haqqani, whom the military identified as a "senior operative" in Hezbollah’s air defense unit.

"In recent months, al-Haqqani had been involved in attempts to rehabilitate military infrastructure belonging to Hezbollah’s air defense array," the military said.

The other operative was killed in a strike earlier on Ansariyeh. He was not identified by name by the IDF, although it said he too was involved in efforts to restore the terror group’s infrastructure.

"The terrorists’ activities constituted a violation of the understandings between Israel and Lebanon," the military said.

The IDF has launched strikes against what it says are Hezbollah efforts to rearm or rebuild in southern Lebanon on a near-daily basis since November 2024, when a ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon brought an end to all-out war with the Iran-backed terror group.

On Monday afternoon, the military issued evacuation warnings for several buildings in Kfar Tebnit and Ain Qana, before launching a wave of strikes in the two southern Lebanon towns.

The strikes, it said after, targeted Hezbollah weapons depots "located in the heart of a civilian population."

It said this was "another example of the cynical use by the Hezbollah terror organizations of Lebanese civilians as human shields," and warned again that such activities were "a violation of the understandings between Israel and Lebanon and a threat to the State of Israel."

There were no immediate reports of any injuries or deaths in the airstrikes.

Separately on Monday, the United Nations
...boodling on the grand scale...
Interim Force in Lebanon accused the Israeli military of dropping an "unknown chemical substance" over areas near the Blue Line on Sunday, delaying the observers’ activities for nine hours.

UNIFIL said it was told by the IDF that it would be "carrying out an aerial activity dropping what they said was a non-toxic chemical substance over areas near the Blue Line."

"The IDF said that peacekeepers should stay away and remain under cover, forcing them to cancel over a dozen activities," the observer force said.

"Peacekeepers could not perform normal operations near the Blue Line along about a third of its length and were only able to resume normal activities after over nine hours," UNFIL said, adding that its observers also supported the Lebanese army in "collecting samples to be tested for toxicity."

Lebanon’s agriculture ministry was expected to return the results of the testing within 48 hours, according to the state-run National News Agency.

"This activity was unacceptable and contrary to resolution 1701," it charged. "The IDF’s deliberate and planned actions not only limited peacekeepers’ ability to undertake their mandated activities, but also potentially put their health and that of civilians at risk."

"It also raised concerns about the effects of this unknown chemical on local agricultural lands, and how this might impact the return of civilians to their homes and livelihoods in the long-term," UNIFIL added.

There was no immediate comment from the IDF on the incident, the latest in a long list of complaints lodged in recent months by the UN body against the Israeli military, which has maintained troops in five sensitive locations in Lebanon even after the remainder of Israeli forces withdrew in line with the terms of the November 2024 ceasefire.

Posted by:trailing wife

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