Israel assassinated a senior commander of the Palestinian Fatah movement in Lebanon on Wednesday, accusing him of organizing attacks in the West Bank.
In response, the murdered militant’s Fatah party accused Israel of attempting to “ignite a regional war”.
According to Fatah and a Lebanese security source, Khalil Maqdah was murdered after a missile struck his car in Sidon, southern Lebanon.
The Israeli military stated that an air force “aircraft struck the terrorist Khalil Hussein Khalil Al-Maqdah in the area of Sidon in southern Lebanon.”
According to the military, Maqdah is the brother of Mounir Maqdah, who leads the Lebanese branch of Fatah’s armed wing, the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, and both are accused of “directing terror attacks and smuggling weapons” to Israel-occupied West Bank.
It said that the two “collaborated on behalf of” Iran’s Revolutionary Guards.
The attack is the first incident on a prominent member of Fatah, the movement led by Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas, in more than ten months of cross-border fighting between Israel and Lebanon’s Hezbollah movement since the Gaza war.
According to Fatah, Maqdah was murdered by Israeli warplanes on Sidon. He was a leader of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades in Lebanon.
According to the statement, Maqdah played “a central role” in “supporting the Palestinian people and its resistance” during the Gaza war, as well as a “important role in supporting resistance cells” in the West Bank for many years.
A top Fatah leader in the West Bank city of Ramallah accused Israel of murdering him in order to trigger a regional conflict.
The “assassination of a Fatah official is further proof that Israel wants to ignite a full-scale war in the region,” Tawfiq Tirawy, a member of Fatah’s central committee, told AFP in Ramallah.
Fatah supporters rally
Maqdah was slain in a car attack, according to Fathi Abu al-Aradat, a senior member of the group that opposes Hamas, the Palestinian Islamist rulers of Gaza.
A Lebanese security source and Lebanon’s official National News Agency both reported the same information.
An AFP correspondent at the scene reported that a car was hit near the Palestinian refugee camps of Ain al-Helweh and Mieh Mieh, and that rescuers had extracted a body from the burnt vehicle.
According to the AFP correspondent, dozens of irate Fatah supporters gathered inside the Ain al-Helweh camp, and gunshots were fired into the air.
Since the Palestinian militant group’s October 7 strike on Israel launched the Gaza conflict, Hezbollah and its allies have traded fire with Israel on a regular basis in support of Hamas.
According to AFP, the violence has killed 593 people in Lebanon, the majority of whom are Hezbollah combatants, but at least 130 are civilians.
According to army data, 23 soldiers and 26 civilians have been killed on Israeli territory, including the occupied Golan Heights.
Fatah has not publicized any attacks on Israel from Lebanon since the conflict began, nor has it grieved members killed by Israeli fire in Lebanon.
Hamas and Fatah have been bitter enemies since Hamas militants drove Fatah out of Gaza after deadly hostilities following Hamas’ landslide victory in a 2006 election.
Fatah governs the Palestinian Authority, which has some administrative control over the Israeli-occupied West Bank.