BEIRUT
\nIsrael said that it killed the commander of Hezbollah\u2019s elite unit in a strike that Lebanese officials said left 14 dead and dozens wounded in the movement\u2019s Beirut stronghold.
\nIbrahim Aqil, who was wanted by the United States for involvement in the 1983 bombing of the US embassy in Beirut, headed the Iran-backed militant group\u2019s elite Radwan Force.
\nHezbollah confirmed late Friday that Aqil had been killed by Israeli fire, hailing him as \u201cone of its great leaders\u201d.
\nEye witnesses at the scene said the blast left a massive crater and gutted the lower floors of a high-rise building in the Lebanese capital\u2019s southern suburbs.
\nRescue workers were still using heavy equipment to search the rubble hours after the strike, AFPTV footage showed.
\nAqil\u2019s killing was the second of a senior Hezbollah commander since the start of the war in Gaza. An Israeli strike on Beirut in July killed Fuad Shukr, a top operations chief for the movement.
\nIt also followed two waves of explosions, on Tuesday and Wednesday, of communication devices used by Hezbollah members, which Hezbollah blamed on Israel.
\nThose blasts killed dozens and left Hezbollah reeling while shifting the focus of the Israel-Hamas war northward.
\nStephane Dujarric, spokesman for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, said the body was \u201cvery concerned about the heightened escalation\u201d and called for \u201cmaximum restraint\u201d from all sides.
\nThe Israeli military said it conducted a \u201ctargeted strike\u201d against Aqil, which also killed around 10 other senior Radwan commanders.
\nA source close to Hezbollah said Aqil was \u201cat a meeting with commanders\u201d when he was killed. Lebanon\u2019s health ministry said that the attack killed at least 14 people and wounded 66 more, and that it expected more bodies to be found.
\nThe United States had offered a $7 million reward for information on Aqil, describing him as a \u201cprincipal member\u201d of an organisation that claimed the 1983 embassy bombing, which killed 63 people.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
BEIRUT Israel said that it killed the commander of Hezbollah\u2019s elite unit in a strike that Lebanese officials said left 14 dead and dozens wounded in the movement\u2019s Beirut stronghold. Ibrahim Aqil, who was wanted by the United States for involvement in the 1983 bombing of the US embassy in Beirut, headed the Iran-backed militant […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":432683,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-432738","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"yoast_head":"\n