Hezbollah yesterday was to hold a funeral for its top military chief and other members of the militant group, a day after Israel killed them with a strike on Beirut’s southern suburbs.
Haytham Ali Tabatabai is the most senior Hezbollah commander to be killed by Israel since a November 2024 ceasefire sought to end more than a year of hostilities between the two sides.
Tabatabai’s assassination comes as Israel has escalated its attacks on Lebanon, with the US increasing its pressure on the Lebanese government to disarm Hezbollah.
Photo: Reuters
The group called on its supporters to attend the mass funeral for its “great leader” Tabatabai, which was to take place in the southern suburbs, a densely populated area where it holds sway.
The Israeli military on Sunday said that it had “eliminated the terrorist Haytham Ali Tabatabai, Hezbollah’s chief of general staff.”
The group announced the death of Tabatabai and four other members in the attack.
Hezbollah said Tabatabai assumed the role of military leader after the most recent war with Israel, which saw the group suffer heavy losses, including the killings of its senior leaders.
Israel has repeatedly bombed Lebanon despite the truce, usually saying it is targeting Hezbollah members and infrastructure to stop the group from rearming.
Hezbollah was to pull its forces north of the Litani River, about 30km north of the border with Israel and have its military infrastructure there dismantled, according to the agreement.
Under a government-approved plan, the Lebanese army is to dismantle Hezbollah military infrastructure south of the river by the end of the year, before tackling the rest of the nation.
Hezbollah has strongly rejected the move.
After the assassination, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he would “not allow Hezbollah to rebuild its power” and called on the Lebanese government to “fulfill its commitment to disarm Hezbollah.”
A source close to Hezbollah said on condition of anonymity that there are currently “two opinions within the group — those who wish to respond to the assassination and those who want to refrain from doing so — but the leadership tends to adopt the utmost forms of diplomacy at the present stage.”
The group’s choices now seem limited. Not only was it weakened by the last war with Israel, it also lost its supply route through Syria with the fall of former Syrian president Bashar al-Assad in December last year.
In addition to disarmament, Washington is also demanding that Beirut dry up the group’s funding from Iran, which slammed Sunday’s “cowardly” assassination.
“Hezbollah’s options are very limited,” Atlantic Council researcher Nicholas Blanford said, as “its support base is clamoring for revenge, but if Hezbollah responds directly ... Israel will strike back very hard, and no one in Lebanon will thank Hezbollah for that.”
Blanford said the strike was the biggest blow to Hezbollah since the ceasefire “because of [Tabatabai’s] seniority and the fact that it demonstrates the Israelis can still locate and target senior officials despite whatever protective measures Hezbollah is undertaking” after the war.
LIMITS: While China increases military pressure on Taiwan and expands its use of cognitive warfare, it is unwilling to target tech supply chains, the report said US and Taiwan military officials have warned that the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) could implement a blockade within “a matter of hours” and need only “minimal conversion time” prior to an attack on Taiwan, a report released on Tuesday by the US Senate’s China Economic and Security Review Commission said. “While there is no indication that China is planning an imminent attack, the United States and its allies and partners can no longer assume that a Taiwan contingency is a distant possibility for which they would have ample time to prepare,” it said. The commission made the comments in its annual
DETERMINATION: Beijing’s actions toward Tokyo have drawn international attention, but would likely bolster regional coordination and defense networks, the report said Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s administration is likely to prioritize security reforms and deterrence in the face of recent “hybrid” threats from China, the National Security Bureau (NSB) said. The bureau made the assessment in a written report to the Legislative Yuan ahead of an oral report and questions-and-answers session at the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee tomorrow. The key points of Japan’s security reforms would be to reinforce security cooperation with the US, including enhancing defense deployment in the first island chain, pushing forward the integrated command and operations of the Japan Self-Defense Forces and US Forces Japan, as
INTERCEPTION: The 30km test ceiling shows that the CSIST is capable of producing missiles that could stop inbound missiles as they re-enter the atmosphere Recent missile tests by the Chungshan Institute of Science and Technology (CSIST) show that Taiwan’s missiles are capable of intercepting ballistic missiles as they re-enter the atmosphere and pose a significant deterrent to Chinese missile threats, former Hsiung Feng III missile development project chief engineer Chang Cheng (張誠) said yesterday. The military-affiliated institute has been conducting missile tests, believed to be related to Project Chiang Kung (強弓) at Pingtung County’s Jiupeng Military Base, with many tests deviating from past practices of setting restriction zones at “unlimited” and instead clearly stating a 30.48km range, Chang said. “Unlimited” restrictions zones for missile tests is
PUBLIC SAFETY: The nationwide distribution campaign aims to enhance society’s overall understanding of threats and bolster defense awareness, an official said The latest edition of the National Public Safety Guide is being mailed to all citizens starting today to foster public awareness of self-defense in the event of war or natural disasters, the Ministry of National Defense said yesterday. “The guides will be disseminated to the public to enhance society’s overall understanding of threats and bolster defense awareness, demonstrating the government’s emphasis on people’s safety and its determination to pursue self-defense,” All-out Defense Mobilization Agency Director Shen Wei-chih (沈威志) said at the ministry’s news conference. The nationwide distribution campaign was planned according to President Lai William’s (賴清德) Sept. 20 directive, he said, adding
RSS