(LANKAPUVATH | COLOMBO) –Israel has killed top Hezbollah commander Wissam al-Tawil in an air strike in southern Lebanon, the Lebanese armed group says.
Hezbollah on Monday announced the killing of one of its commanders for the first time in three months of cross-border clashes with Israeli forces.
Al-Tawil, 58, also known as “Jawad”, was the deputy head of a unit in the elite Radwan force.
The Lebanese state-run National News Agency reported that the attack was carried out by an Israeli drone about 10:15am (08:15 GMT) on the road to al-Dabshah in the town of Khirbet Selm in the Bint Jbeil district and it killed two people.
There was no immediate comment from Israel.
Who is Wissam Al-Tawil?
Al-Tawil is the highest-ranking Hezbollah member to be killed since the Israel-Hamas war began.
Hezbollah said he joined the group in 1989 and that he participated in several “qualitative” operations against Israeli forces during the occupation of southern Lebanon before 2000 and suffered serious wounds during an attack in 1999.
According to Hezbollah, al-Tawil was also part of an operation that captured two Israeli soldiers in 2006. Israel retaliated by launching a full-scale offensive against Hezbollah that would become known as the Second Lebanon War in Israel and the July War in Lebanon.
Al-Tawil also fought in Syria, where the Lebanese group fought alongside government forces against the country’s opposition.
Since October 7, Hezbollah said, he had led several attacks against Israeli army positions across the Lebanese border “in support of the Palestinian people in Gaza and their honourable and courageous resistance”.
