BEIRUT — The military wing of the Lebanese movement Hezbollah has been instructed by Iran to suspend operations against Israel and to target Saudi Arabia instead, Middle East Eye has revealed.
According to well informed sources in Lebanon, the order was conveyed in person by Qasim Soleimani, the head of the Quds Force of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard (IRGC).
Soleimani also named successor to Mustafa Badreddine, who was killed in Syria. His two deputies were also named.
Badreddine’s replacement is Fuad Shukr, whose nom de guerre is Al-Hajj Mohsen, the sources told MEE.
According to the MEE sources, the instruction Iran gave was to initiate actions against Saudi Arabia before the beginning of Haj in September.
Shukr’s task is to co-ordinate military actions with an Iraqi Shiite paramilitary group Asa’ib Ahl Al-Haq, and a Shiite group in Bahrain Saraya Al-Mukhtar.
Hezbollah operatives have been used in the past in the Gulf. A member of the Al-Dawa militant group, Badreddine was arrested along with 17 others after the truck bombings of the US and French embassies in Kuwait City in 1983. In 1985 Badreddine was also reportedly involved in a failed assassination attempt of the Kuwaiti emir.
Amed Ibrahim Al-Mughassil, a member of Hezbollah who allegedly masterminded the attack on the US military barracks in Al-Khobar in 1996, was captured last year after a 20-year manhunt.
