# Hezbollah confirms death of Ibrahim Qubaisi as Israel widens strikes in Lebanon
On Sept. 24, 2024, Hezbollah confirmed that senior commander Ibrahim Qubaisi was killed in an Israeli airstrike on an apartment block in Beirut, according to the supplied Al Jazeera report. Israel had already said Qubaisi headed the group's missiles and rocket force, making his death one of the clearest signs yet that the conflict had moved from the border into the Lebanese capital.
The report said Israel began a third day of strikes in southern Lebanon only hours after the confirmation. Lebanese media reported attacks across the south from around 5 a.m., while Hezbollah said it fired a rocket toward Mossad headquarters near Tel Aviv. Israeli sirens sounded and the military said it intercepted the missile. The same report said six soldiers and civilians were injured in later Hezbollah attacks, showing how quickly the exchange was escalating on both fronts.
The wider toll was severe. Lebanon's health minister told Al Jazeera Mubasher TV that Israel's offensive since Monday morning had killed 569 people and wounded 1,835. The previous day had already brought the highest death toll in any single day in Lebanon since the 1975-1990 civil war. Families fled again, filling school shelters in Beirut and Sidon, sleeping in cars and on sidewalks when rooms were unavailable or too expensive.
International reaction was immediate. Britain urged its nationals to leave Lebanon and moved 700 troops to Cyprus to help with possible evacuations. The UN Security Council planned a meeting, while Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned that Lebanon was at the brink and should not become another Gaza. Lebanon's foreign minister said Washington was the only country that could really make a difference and called the U.S. key to the country's salvation, underscoring how central American diplomacy had become to the crisis.
The report also described the military logic behind the campaign. Israel said its air force had struck Hezbollah targets across southern Lebanon, including weapons depots and dozens of launchers, and defense minister Yoav Gallant said the group had suffered severe blows. But Hezbollah continued to launch rockets and drones, and the fighting was also spilling into Syria. In that setting, Qubaisi's death was not just a leadership loss; it was a signal that Israel was now hitting the command structure of one of Hezbollah's most important military units as the war moved into a more dangerous phase.
Qubaisi's death also highlighted the extent to which Israel was trying to degrade Hezbollah's command structure rather than merely hit launch sites. That can matter because the loss of senior figures can affect planning, morale and the group's ability to coordinate attacks. At the same time, the report showed that Hezbollah was still able to fire rockets and drones, which meant leadership losses alone were not ending the war. The larger diplomatic problem remained the same: every new strike made it harder for outside powers to broker anything more than a temporary pause.
The death of a commander matters in a conflict like this because it can change how fast Hezbollah can plan, coordinate and retaliate. But the report also showed that the group still had rockets, drones and a willingness to keep firing, which meant leadership losses alone were not enough to stop the war. Diplomacy remained the only route that outside powers still talked about, even as the fighting deepened.
