Free Republic

They died in their own beds. Hossein Salami and Ali Shamkhani—Iran’s most senior military officers and the stewards of Iran’s nuclear weapons program—had spent years threatening Israel with destruction. They issued taunts, organized terrorist attacks, and orchestrated, since October 7, the encirclement of the Jewish state in a ring of fire of their terror proxies. And they knew—without the slightest illusion—that Israel had the capability and resolve to kill them. This cohort saw the Israeli air force bury Hezbollah’s Hassan Nasrallah in his bunker, hundreds of meters beneath the streets of Beirut. They saw Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh vaporized in...

Astonishing news out of Israel today and confirmed by at least one Israeli TV network that Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) Gen. Esmail Qaani, commander of the crack Quds Force, is in Jerusalem after being identified as an Israeli intelligence asset.There's no doubt that Qaani was under suspicion. On Sept. 27, 2024, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, one of the most well-guarded people in the world, was killed when at least 80 bombs were dropped on a bunker in Beirut, where Nasrallah was meeting with top aides. Qaani was placed under house arrest and interrogated, according to Middle East sources. Qaani...

Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah became depressed and was emotionally changed by Israel’s exploding pager attack on his operatives as well as by strikes that decimated the group’s leadership, his family told Lebanese media. His son said Nasrallah was noticeably no longer the same man, and his daughter revealed that he cried after the beeper attack. Nasrallah’s son, daughter, and three grandchildren spoke to Al-Manar television for interviews that were broadcast on Friday. On September 17, 2024, thousands of pagers used by Hezbollah across Lebanon suddenly exploded, killing dozens of operatives and maiming thousands, marking the beginning of Israel’s escalation against...

CCTV Footage was released today, from Israel’s Precision-Airstrike against Hezbollah’s Central Command Bunker in the Dahieh Suburb of Southern Beirut on September 27th, which resulting in the elimination of the Secretary-General of Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah as well as several… pic.twitter.com/SLzTYiG0WW— OSINTdefender (@sentdefender) February 7, 2025VIDEO AT LINK.........................

The Times will accuse DNI nominee Tulsi Gabbard of meeting with then-Lebanese Hezbollah Supreme Leader Hassan Nasrallah in 2017.The New York Times is preparing to publish a deep state hit piece on President Donald Trump’s nominee for Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard. The piece is purportedly based on National Security Agency (NSA) surveillance of a pair of anonymous terrorists.Two people familiar with the matter told The Federalist the Times will accuse Gabbard, a former Democrat congresswoman from Hawaii, of meeting with then-Lebanese Hezbollah Supreme Leader Hassan Nasrallah on a Middle East trip in 2017. The paper of “all the...

Israel will begin targeting leaders of Yemen’s Houthi rebel group, Defense Minister Israel Katz said Tuesday, vowing that Israel will not allow missile and drone fire on Israel to continue unchecked. Firing at Houthi leaders would seem to mark an escalation by Israel, which has so far targeted port infrastructure and military sites in a handful of sorties in response to repeated launches of drones and ballistic missiles from Yemen. A missile fired early Tuesday was shot down, but sirens in the Tel Aviv area caused widespread panic and a rush to shelter left one woman seriously injured. It was...

US intelligence assessments before Israel escalated its conflict against the Lebanese Hezbollah terror group in September said that such a move risked sparking an all-out war in which hundreds — if not thousands — of Israelis would be killed, three US officials and one Israeli official told The Times of Israel... ...the US officials said, acknowledging that both countries’ assessments proved wildly inaccurate within days, as the IDF methodically took out much of Hezbollah’s missile and drone capabilities, dismantled its military infrastructure in southern Lebanon, picked off almost every member of its senior leadership and killed or wounded thousands of...

Israel's Oct. 26 retaliatory strike on Iran "destroyed an active top secret nuclear weapons research facility," according to an Axios report. The news outlet spoke to various U.S. and Israeli officials about the strikes, including one on Iran's Parchin Military Complex, a nuclear research facility that was "previously reported to be inactive." "One former Israeli official briefed on the strike said it destroyed sophisticated equipment used to design the plastic explosives that surround uranium in a nuclear device and are needed to detonate it." Iran claims to have brought its military nuclear program to a halt in 2003, and yet...

An official close to the Prime Minister tells The Time of Israel that Defense Minister Yoav Gallant was fired for professional reasons, and not because of coalition politics. The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, says that Gallant “functioned as a rubber stamp for the IDF and did not challenge it even once.” The defense minister, claims the official, advocated a diplomatic solution in Lebanon six months ago that would not have diminished Hezbollah’s capabilities, and opposed the killing of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah until the IDF backed the move. On Gaza, claims the official, Gallant resisted the IDF going...

CNN - Hezbollah has named Shiite cleric Naim Qassem as leader, over a month after his predecessor Hassan Nasrallah was killed in an Israeli airstrike. The group’s Senior Council elected Qassem as secretary-general, Hezbollah’s media office said in a statement on Tuesday, adding that Qassem is committed to prophet “Mohammed’s authentic Islam” and the core principles of the group. Qassem now leads a group once regarded as Iran’s most formidable proxy in its conflict with Israel – a force that, in recent weeks, has been significantly weakened by Israeli strikes, with top leaders killed, thousands of fighters wounded, and missile...

Long-serving deputy secretary-general of the terror group is approved by Hezbollah's religious council after the designated successor of Hasan Nasrallah, Hashem Safieddine is also killed in a targeted strike. Yoav Gallant:The appointment is temporary. The countdown has begun. https://x.com/yoavgallant/status/1851245367720919450

According to a report from Israel’s Channel 12, each Hezbollah pager that exploded was individually set to detonate, with those behind the attack having precise knowledge of their targets’ locations and movements to minimize collateral damage. “Each pager had its own arrangements. That’s how it was possible to control who was hit and who wasn’t,” an unnamed foreign security source told the TV station. The attackers reportedly ensured that only the person carrying the pager was harmed, sparing civilians who may have been nearby at the time of the blasts. Footage from the incident showed one man being killed by...

The Israelis have astounded the world in recent weeks with several unparalleled feats of wartime ingenuity, most notably the explosion of thousands of pagers that belonged to high-level Hezbollah operatives. Topping even that was the elimination of arch-terrorist and media darling Hassan Nasrallah of Hezbollah, who had been in hiding for nearly two decades and was in a bunker sixty feet underground when the Israelis found a way to take him out. One Muslim cleric in Iran, however, is certain that the Israelis’ success can’t be ascribed to their ingenuity; he thinks they had some help. Help, that is, of...

Jerusalem: Israel's army confirmed Tuesday it "eliminated" Hezbollah's Hashem Safieddine, apparent successor of slain leader Hassan Nasrallah, in a strike in a southern Beirut suburb three weeks ago. "It can now be confirmed that in an attack approximately three weeks ago, Hashem Safieddine, the head of Hezbollah's Executive Council, and Ali Hussein Hazima, the head of Hezbollah's Intelligence Directorate, were killed along with other Hezbollah commanders," the army said in a statement. Hezbollah has not yet issued a statement regarding the CLAIM. On October 8, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that the military has "taken out" Safieddine, without specifically...

Israel on Tuesday confirmed it had killed Hashem Safieddine, the heir apparent to late Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah who was killed last month in an Israeli attack targeting the Iran-backed Lebanese militant group. The military said Safieddine was killed in a strike carried out three weeks ago in Beirut's southern suburbs, its first confirmation of his death. Earlier this month, Israel said he had probably been eliminated. There was no immediate response from Hezbollah to Israel's statement that it had killed Safieddine. "We have reached Nasrallah, his replacement and most of Hezbollah's senior leadership. We will reach anyone who threatens...

So says Al-Hurra, which is interesting of itself, but we'll get to that in a moment. According to Open Source Intelligence Monitor, Arab countries have sent back-channel approval for an Israeli strike on Iran in response to the ballistic-missile attack earlier this month. They understandably want the attack to remain focused and disciplined to prevent a wider war, and they want a heads-up before the attack to prepare a common defense. In fact, OSINT notes that this appears to be a case of getting the Nasrallah-hit band back together again: Al-Hurra is reporting that several Arab Counties have recently sent...

Naim Qassem, the most senior Hezbollah leader after the assassination of Nasrallah and his successor Safieddine, has called for an unconditional ceasefire, apparently not contingent on a cessation of fighting in Gaza. The former deputy to Hassan Nasrallah and member of Hezbollah’s Jihad Council announced on Tuesday night that the terror group was “agreeing to a ceasefire without preconditions. First, a ceasefire achieved through diplomatic means, and then we will discuss all the details.” Experts believe that the announcement was issued at the behest of Iran and was prompted by the terror proxy’s military weakness after repeated Israeli strikes and...

Ceasefire now? As much as Kamala Harris wants one and would capitalize upon one if it did materialize, the answer must be a firm no. After exploding pagers and a series of carefully targeted Israeli airstrikes have completely decimated Hezbollah's senior leadership, the jihad terror organization now wants a ceasefire with Israel. This will come as music to the ears of the Biden-Harris regime, which would like nothing better than an October peace agreement between Israel and one of the major players that are arrayed against it. The Harris campaign could wave this agreement in the air every time someone...

The Hezbollah Shura Council on Sunday chose Hashem Safieddine as Secretary General to replace Hassan Nasrallah, who was eliminated in an Israeli airstrike on Friday, Saudi news outlets Al Hadath and Al Arabiya reported. Safieddine currently serves as the head of Hezbollah's Executive Council. He is Nasrallah's cousin from his mother's side. His brother, Abdullah, is Hezbollah's envoy to Iran. In addition, Safieddine is one of six clerics currently serving on Hezbollah's Shura Council. His son, Said Ridah, is married to Zayneb Soleimani, the daughter of former Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani, who was eliminated in 2020. Hezbollah denied the...

There are short-term jobs, and then there are really short-term jobs. It would seem that being the leader of the terrorist group Hezbollah falls into the latter category. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu confirmed Tuesday that the Israel Defense Forces eliminated the replacement of former Hezbollah boss Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, who was killed in late September, as well as another possible successor to the top job. Netanyahu appeared on television to speak directly to the Lebanese people: "Today, Hezbollah is weaker than it has been for many, many years," Netanyahu said in a message tailored directly to the "people of...