Hezbollah announced on Wednesday the death of Hashem Safieddine, head of the Executive Council of the pro-Iranian movement and who was considered the leading candidate to succeed Hassan Nasrallah in leading the party.
In a statement, Hezbollah said that Safieddine was killed “in a Zionist raid” along with other party members, without specifying the date or location of the incident. The Israeli army had previously announced that it had “eliminated” Safieddine along with senior Hezbollah official Ali Hussein Hazima in a strike targeting the southern suburbs of Beirut about three weeks ago.
A source close to Hezbollah indicated that Safieddine was “the most likely candidate” to succeed Nasrallah, who had been killed in an Israeli strike on September 27 in the southern suburbs of Beirut.
A Hezbollah official had told AFP on October 5 that contact with Safieddine had been “lost” since the violent Israeli strikes targeting the southern suburbs of Beirut, the stronghold of the pro-Iranian movement, the day before.