Israel Targets Likely Hezbollah Successor In New Beirut Attacks

Update(1939ET): Israel is conducting more major airstrikes in Beirut Thursday evening. Israeli officials are now claiming that strikes last night targeted head of Hezbollah’s executive committee Hashim Safi al-Din. He’s been widely reported as the likely successor to take over the Shia paramilitary group after Nasrallah’s killing last week.

“Safi al-Din is the leading figure to succeed Hassan Nasrallah as Hezbollah’s leader. An Israeli official said Safi al-Din was in a bunker deep underground and it isn’t yet clear whether he was killed in the strike,” Axios is reporting.

The strikes that targeted the Safi al-Din have been described as even larger than the ones the killed Nasrallah. Casualty numbers are as yet unconfirmed. On Thursday night, Al Jazeera reports the following:

Our colleagues at Al Jazeera Arabic report that the Israeli military has blown up residential buildings northwest of Nuseirat camp.

Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud reported earlier that the military has been striking the western part of Nuseirat refugee camp on almost an hourly basis.