(JNS) — An Israeli drone strike on a Hamas office in Beirut eliminated top terror chief Saleh al-Arouri on Tuesday, January 2nd, Hamas’s Al-Aqsa Radio announced.
The explosion rocked the south Beirut suburb of Dahiyeh, a Hezbollah stronghold. At least three other Hamas operatives were also killed in the blast, Reuters reported.
Al-Arouri, the commander of Hamas operations in Judea and Samaria and the deputy politburo chief under Hamas chairman Ismail Haniyeh, had been based in Lebanon in recent years.
He was one of the top Hamas leaders on Israel’s target list following the terrorist group’s Oct. 7 massacre of at least 1,200 people in the northwestern Negev.
In a statement cited by Saudi Arabia’s Al Arabiya channel last week, Hamas described al-Arouri as the “architect” of the massacre.
Al-Arouri was informed of the impending invasion half an hour beforehand so he could alert Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, French outlet Le Figaro reported.
Local media said Nasrallah canceled a speech scheduled for that Tuesday, following the reports of al-Arouri’s death.
Israeli forces raided a home in Samaria belonging to al-Arouri on Oct. 21, detaining more than 20 people, including one of his brothers and nine of his nephews.
Al-Arouri is credited with orchestrating the deep relationship between Hamas and Iran, and also played a key role in re-establishing the Palestinian terrorist group’s ties with Damascus, which were severed in 2012 during the Syrian civil war.
He was recruited into Hamas in 1985 while studying Sharia law at Hebron University and had served 18 years in Israeli prisons. He was deported to Syria in 2010.
