Badreddine’s death is the biggest blow to the militant group since the 2008 assassination of his predecessor, Imad Mughniyeh, who was killed in a bomb attack in Damascus. Yet those reports are now being revisited, with subsequent reports saying the cause of the explosion was unclear, and Hezbollah announcing an investigation into what happened. After that, Badreddine became Hezbollah’s top military commander and adviser to the group’s leader, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah. The US government believed Badreddine, 55, was in charge of Hizbollah’s military operations in Syria.
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And despite a pledge to avenge the death of its previous military commander, Imad Mughniyeh, killed in Damascus in 2008, it failed to do so.
Whatever its source, the explosion cut short the career of a man widely considered to be the group’s No. 2 leader as well as the heir apparent of Imad Mugniyeh, the Hezbollah operative assassinated by the Central Intelligence Agency and the Mossad in 2008 in the Syrian capital, and Badreddine’s brother-in-law.
– SAUDI ARABIA: The kingdom does not have a known history of sponsoring assassinations or of targeting Hezbollah directly, but tensions between it and the Lebanese Shiite group are at an all-time high.
Thousands of people attended Friday’s funeral services for Badreddine in Lebanon’s capital, Beirut.
Born in southern Beirut in 1961, Badreddine, started fighting as a teenager for Palestinian factions that dominated Beirut’s southern suburbs during Lebanon’s civil war. “We are going to pursue an inquiry to determine the nature and causes of the explosion and ascertain whether it was the result of an air strike, a missile or artillery fire”.
Accused of being the mastermind behind the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri in 2005, he was one of five people on trial in absentia at an worldwide court in the Netherlands over the killing. “He boosts us with his martyrdom with strength, glory, will and intention to continue the fight against the Zionist enemy and the takfiris (Sunni extremists) until victory is achieved, God willing”.
– April 30, 2013: Hezbollah fighters are aiding troops in Syria to combat the revolt, Nasrallah reveals, adding that Hezbollah and Iran could intervene on the ground.
Hizbollah, a political and military movement and Lebanon’s most powerful group, has grown ever stronger since forcing Israel to end its 22-year occupation of southern Lebanon in 2000.
Israel has also conducted at least eight airstrikes in Syria since the beginning of the war there in 2011, including an attack in January of a year ago that, according to Israeli media sources, was meant for Badreddine. “The thing that I can confirm is that there were no USA or coalition aircraft in the area where he was reported to be killed”. He’d participated in most of the group’s operations since the early 1980s, the group said, releasing pictures of Badreddine in full military uniform. Badreddine’s only son, Ali, wept as a senior Hezbollah official, Hashim Safieddine, hugged him.
Hezbollah’s traditional enemy, Israel, has assassinated its leaders in the past.
Still, the slaying was unlikely to lead Hezbollah to reduce its role in Syria. Saudi Arabia suspended a $3 billion program funding Lebanon’s security forces because of Hezbollah’s power there and it backed an Arab League decision to label the group a terrorist organization. They have warned their citizens against traveling to Lebanon as well as cut Lebanese satellite broadcasts, and closed a Saudi-backed broadcaster in Lebanon.
“This is a prince of Hezbollah, second only to the late Mughniyeh”, said Levitt.
Hezbollah has paid a steep price for its bloody foray into Syria’s civil war, beyond its casualties.
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In Beirut, Hezbollah expert Waddah Charara said Badreddine had also been responsible for training Shiite militiamen in Iraq and had a direct link with Iran.
