INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Tuesday Israeli airstrikes had killed two successors to Hezbollah&s slain leader, as Israel
expanded its ground offensive against the Iran-backed group with a fourth army division deployed into south Lebanon, Reuters
reported.Netanyahu spoke in a video released by his office hours after the deputy leader of Hezbollah, which is reeling after a spate of
killings of senior commanders in Israeli airstrikes, left the door open to a negotiated ceasefire.&We&ve degraded Hezbollah&s capabilities
We took out thousands of terrorists, including (Hassan) Nasrallah himself and Nasrallah&s replacement, and the replacement of the
replacement,& Netanyahu said, without naming the latter two.Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said Hashem Safieddine, the man expected
to succeed Nasrallah, had probably been &eliminated&
It was not immediately clear whom Netanyahu meant by the &replacement of the replacement&.Later, Israeli military spokesman Daniel Hagari
said Israel knew Safieddine was in Hezbollah&s intelligence headquarters when fighter jets bombed it last week and Safieddine&s status was
&being checked and when we know, we will inform the public.&Safieddine has not been heard from publicly since that airstrike, part of an
escalating Israeli offensive after a year of border clashes with Hezbollah
The group is the most formidably armed of Iran&s proxy forces across the Middle East and has been acting in support of Palestinian militants
fighting Israel in Gaza.&Today, Hezbollah is weaker than it has been for many, many years,& Netanyahu said.Israel&s military said on Tuesday
that heavy air strikes against underground Hezbollah installations in southern Lebanon over the prior 24 hours killed at least 50 fighters
including six sector commanders and regional officials.The heightened regional tensions kindled a year ago by Palestinian armed group Hamas&
attack from Gaza on southern Israel have escalated in recent weeks to engulf Lebanon, read the report.On Oct
1, Iran, sponsor of both Hezbollah and Hamas, fired missiles at Israel
On Tuesday, Iran warned Israel not to follow through on threats of retaliation.Its foreign minister said any attack on Iran&s infrastructure
would be avenged while a senior Iranian official told Gulf states it would be &unacceptable& and would draw a response if they allowed their
airspace to be used against Iran.Western powers are seeking a diplomatic solution, fearing the conflict could roil the wider, oil-producing
Middle East.The Pentagon on Tuesday announced that Gallant will not go ahead with a visit to Washington and a meeting with his U.S
counterpart, Lloyd Austin, planned for Wednesday.In a televised speech from an undisclosed location, Hezbollah&s deputy leader Naim Qassem
said he backed attempts to secure a truce.For the first time, the end of war in Gaza was not mentioned as a pre-condition to halting the
Qassem said Hezbollah backed moves by Speaker of Parliament Nabih Berri, a Hezbollah ally, to secure a halt to the fighting.Netanyahu&s
office declined to comment on Qassem&s remarks
State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller told a briefing in Washington that Hezbollah had &changed their tune and want a ceasefire&
because the group is &on the back foot and is getting battered& on the battlefield.Qassem said Hezbollah&s capabilities were intact despite
&painful blows& from Israel
&Dozens of cities are within range of the resistance&s missiles
We assure you that our capabilities are fine.&The Israeli military said it had sent the 146th Division into south Lebanon, the first reserve
division to have been deployed over the border, and was extending ground operations against Hezbollah from southeast Lebanon into its
southwest, Reuters reported.A military spokesperson declined to say how many troops were in Lebanon at one time
But the military had previously announced that three other army divisions were operating there, meaning that thousands of soldiers were
likely on Lebanese soil.The Israeli military announced on Oct
1 that ground forces had entered Lebanon, initially with commando units that were then followed by regular armoured units and infantry
units.Overnight, Israel again bombed Beirut&s southern suburbs where Hezbollah is headquartered and said it had killed a figure responsible
for budgeting and logistics, Suhail Hussein Husseini & the latest in a string of assassinations of some of Hezbollah&s top officials.The
Israeli military on Tuesday issued a new evacuation warning for residents, especially in specific buildings in Beirut&s southern suburbs,
where Hezbollah has its headquarters, read the report.In northern Israel not far from the Lebanon border, warning sirens sounded regularly
throughout Tuesday as authorities said Hezbollah fired almost 200 rockets into Israel.An Israeli military spokesperson said over 3,000
rockets had been fired into Israel from Lebanon so far in October, but interceptions by air defences had prevented many casualties and
significant damage.Targets on Tuesday again included Haifa, the northern port city where there were multiple reports of damage to buildings
Israel&s military said it had struck the launchers that fired the missiles at Haifa.The mushrooming Israeli-Hezbollah conflict has killed
well over 1,000 people in Lebanon in the past two weeks and prompted the mass flight of more than a million.Israel&s stated objective is to
make its northern areas safe from Hezbollah rocket fire and allow thousands of displaced residents to return.The post Israel says it has
killed slain Hezbollah leader&s successors first appeared on Ariana News.
