Ibrahim Aqil headed Hezbollah’s elite Radwan Force. He was reportedly attending a meeting with other commanders when he was killed. The Israeli military said it conducted a “targeted strike” against Aqil, which also killed around 10 other senior Radwan commanders.Hezbollah confirmed late Friday that Aqil had been killed by Israel, hailing him as “one of its great leaders”.According to reports, Aqil was the second-in-command in the group’s military after Fuad Shukr, who was also killed in an Israeli strike in Beirut on July 30.Like most of Hezbollah’s military leadership, little was known about Ibrahim Aqil, whom group members knew only by his nom de guerre Hajj Abdul Qader.His Radwan Force spearheaded Hezbollah’s ground operations and Israel has repeatedly demanded that its fighters be pushed away from the border.Aqil was wanted by the United States for involvement in the 1983 bombing of the US embassy in Beirut. The US had offered a $7 million reward for information on Aqil, describing him as a “principal member” of an organisation that claimed the 1983 embassy bombing, which killed 63 people.According to the US, Aqil was also involved in the hostage-taking of two Germans in the late 1980s and bombings in Paris in 1986.In 2015, the US Treasury sanctioned Aqil and Shukr as terrorists, and in 2019, the US State Department branded him a “Specially Designated Global Terrorist”.
The latest blow to Hezbollah came after thousands of its operatives’ pagers and walkie-talkies exploded over two days, killing 37 people and wounding thousands of others.
