A leader of the military wing of Fatah, the most important Palestinian party, was killed in an attack attributed to Israel on Wednesday (21) in Saida, in southern Lebanon, a member of the Palestinian political force and a Lebanese security source reported. The man was Khalil Magdah, a leader of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, one of the militias linked to Fatah.
This is the first confirmed death of a member of the party of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas since the start of cross-border crossfire between Israeli forces and the Lebanese Shiite movement Hezbollah just over ten months ago.
Khalil Maqdah “was the target of the Israeli attack in Saida,” Fathi Abu Al-Aradat, a senior member of the Palestinian political force, told French news agency AFP.
Also speaking to AFP, a Lebanese security source said the Israeli attack targeted the leader’s car as it was driving near Palestinian camps near Saida, the main city in southern Lebanon.
An AFP correspondent reported a burning car from which emergency medical teams removed a body.
In a statement to the Beirut-based al-Mayadeen channel, Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades leader Mounir Maqdah confirmed that the attack targeted his brother Khalil Maqdah, adding that he was a senior official in Fatah’s military wing and a member of the brigades.
In Ramallah, the seat of the Palestinian Authority in the occupied West Bank, a member of Fatah’s central committee said the “assassination” of Khalil Maqdah was “further proof that Israel wants to set the region on fire and plunge it into all-out war.”
“The occupation forces are using Palestinian blood (…) to fuel the fire of war” in the Gaza Strip, said Toufiq Tirawy, also quoted by AFP.
Since the start of the war in the Gaza Strip last October, the Lebanese Shiite movement Hezbollah (pro-Iran) and its allies, including the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, have claimed responsibility for attacks on Israel from southern Lebanon, but Fatah has not been associated with this wave of violence.
The Israeli army has retaliated with attacks inside Lebanese territory, targeting Hezbollah leaders in particular.
