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The Israeli army announced on Saturday that Israel carried out the fatal strike targeting Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah after learning that he would meet with a number of senior leaders at the group’s underground central command headquarters in the southern suburbs of Beirut.
The strike came shortly after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stated before the United Nations General Assembly in New York that Israel would not accept the presence of Hezbollah forces on its borders, following the assassination of a number of the group’s senior leaders over the past few weeks.
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Israeli army spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Nadav Shoshani said the operation, which the army called “New Order,” took place on Friday while Nasrallah and Hezbollah’s senior chain of command were meeting to plan further attacks on Israel.
“We had real-time intelligence, an opportunity, an operational opportunity that allowed us to carry out this attack,” he told reporters.
Israeli Army Radio quoted the commander of the Air Force squadron that carried out the attack as saying that the pilots did not receive details of the target until shortly before take-off.
