Hezbollah commander on U.S. 'most wanted' list killed

[Amerigo Vespucci]

Source: CNN

BEIRUT, Lebanon (CNN) -- A senior Hezbollah commander implicated in some of the most high-profile international terrorist attacks of the last 25 years has died in an explosion in Syria, Hezbollah TV said Wednesday.

Imad Mughniyeh was suspected by Western intelligence agencies in the 1983 bombing of the U.S. Embassy in Beirut, which killed 63 people, as well as the truck bombing that year of the U.S. Marine barracks there, an attack that killed 241 people and preceded the U.S. military withdrawal from Lebanon, according to a CNN report from 2001.

The FBI listed Mughniyeh as one of its "Most Wanted Terrorists," blaming him for his role in the June 14, 1985, hijacking of TWA 847, a terrorist episode that captivated television viewers in the United States and around the world for more than two weeks.

Hijackers seized the plane as it traveled from Athens, Greece, to Rome, Italy, and forced it to land at the airport in Beirut, starting a 17-day ordeal during which a U.S. Navy diver, Robert Dean Stethem, was shot and killed.

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/meast/02/13/hezbollah/index.html

[Thothmes]

1. Mosad (sic) strikes again.

[AlertLurker]

2. More likely CIA proxies.

Israel would probably claim responsibility as an intelligence/counterinsurgency coup if it was a Mossad hit, as they have for other targetted assassinations in the past.

[Thothmes]

3. The Israelis have denyed any connection with his death.

[AlertLurker]

4. My point, exactly.

[1620rock]

5. Err, was he the number two man again?...if you get my drift.

[AlertLurker]

6. It actually could have been ANYBODY.

The number of foreign controlled political orgnizations operating in Lebanon is positively astounding...

But, yes - once again, they are claiming the number two man - mainly because they know that they will never get close enought to the number one, Nasrallah...

[probablereason]

7. MSM is missing biggest terror related news in over a decade

if this is truly Imad M. this is big. In terms of being a real and credible threat and participant in wide ranging state-sponsored terrorist attacks, Imad has definitely out-ranked Osama by a lot of measurements. Further, Osama's only been on the run for less than 7 years, Imad has managed to escape numerous attempts on his life and has been on the run for well over 20. Unlike Bin Laden, he is suspected to have been an operational leader, responsible for tactics and strategy, and not just money and a lot of propaganda video tapes. Further, while being at or near the top of the US, French, and Israeli hitlist for more than two decades, he is believed to have remained operationally effective and fully able to travel between Syria and Iran. Bin Laden is more symbolic, but having this guy not around, if it is even true that he's dead, would be a big progress towards reducing extremist violence in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Imad M. is also not someone who will be replaced by the next true believer, he has proven to be an effective adversary and his departure, again, if it is true, is the biggest news in the real struggle against the use of violence as a political means.

[Zynx]

8. Is this somehow a bad thing?

I see this as a good thing.

[RamboLiberal]

9. Payback: Car Bomb Kills Elusive 'Fox' Terror Boss

Source: ABC News

Despite plastic surgery, a weight gain of 40 pounds and elaborate security precautions, one of the world's most wanted terrorists, Hezbollah commander Imad Mugniyah, has been tracked down and killed in a car-bomb assassination in Damascus, Syria.

Hezbollah television confirmed that Mugniyah, known as the "Fox" because of his ability to elude U.S. and Israeli agents, died in the blast which Hezbollah blamed on Israel.

Mugniyah was linked to a long series of terror attacks against U.S. and Jewish targets, and the U.S. had post a $5 million reward for information on his whereabouts, according to the Rewards for Justice Program Web site.

One of the few photos of Mugniyah showed him brandishing a pistol in the cockpit of the hijacked TWA flight 847 in Beirut, Lebanon in 1985.

He was also linked to the 1983 truck bomb attack that killed 241 U.S. Marines in Beirut and to a 1994 attack on a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires, Argentina that killed 84 people.



Read more: http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/story?id=4282992&page=1

---

Good riddance!

[leftynyc]

10. Excellent news

I see they "blame" Israel. Has Israel taken the well deserved credit for getting rid of this animal?

[theoldman]

11. Probably not because assassinations are frowned upon.

Too bad that the US does not have the same skill.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

12. Hijacking in 1985

was that the one where the Navy SEAL was killed?

[theoldman]

13. Yes.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

14. Ah

Then I know a tidbit about it. The SEAL was the decoy-not the person they were really after.

[jzodda]

15. Yay! They finally got this bastard

Who can forget the TV images of that hijacking? Piece of shit had eluded justice for a quarter century. The reward on his head at the time of his death from the FBI was $25,000,000 so this is a biggie.

[The Croquist]

16. He deserved a trial

Frontier justice is no justice at all.

[jzodda]

17. Your assuming he could have been extracted for trial

It may not have been possible. This happened in Syria, remember. We also do not know who killed him. CIA, Israel? Anti Hezzbollah (Syria) factions from Lebanon? Capturing is far harder then taking him out. If the chance was there to bring him here and it wasn't taken then I would agree with you. I don't feel one bit sorry that he didn't make it to trial though-although I am sure he would have had useful information. Don't kid yourself if they could have gotten him alive, they would want him.