DAR AL ISLAM-SYRIA: IMAD MUGNIYEH, MOSLEM TERRORIST, DEAD

Imad Mughniyeh, Hezbollah terror leader, killed in car bomb
Nicholas Blanford, of The Times, in Beirut


Imad Mughniyeh, the Hezbollah mastermind behind the kidnapping of Westerners in Beirut and many big terror attacks around the world in the 1980s and 1990s, was killed late last night in a car bomb explosion in Damascus.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack, which occurred in the Syrian capital’s smart Kfar Soussa district, although Hezbollah blamed Israeli agents.

His death is a huge blow to the Iranian-backed militant group, given Mughniyeh’s years of experience and organisational skills.

He was commander of Hezbollah’s military wing, which he helped to build up into the formidable machine that fought the Israeli Army to a standstill in the war of summer 2006.

“With all due pride, we declare a great jihadist leader of the Islamic Resistance in Lebanon joining the martyrs . . . The brother commander hajj Imad Mughniyeh became a martyr at the hands of the Zionist Israelis,” said a statement carried by Hezbollah’s Al-Manar television channel. The station broke off normal programming to broadcast verses from the Koran.

Heavy gunfire broke out from the Ain Dilba quarter of the Shia-dominated southern suburbs of Beirut as the news spread. Ain Dilba, a run-down neighbourhood next to Beirut airport, was Mughniyeh’s Beirut home.

Israel today denied any involvement in Mughniyeh’s death. "Israel rejects any attempt by terrorist organisations to attribute to it any implication in this affair,” said a statement from the office of Ehud Olmert, the Prime Minister.

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