Assassination of a leader in the Islamic Jihad movement and his daughter in an Israeli raid on Baalbek

Israeli occupation aircraft carried out a new assassination operation targeting a prominent leader in the Islamic Jihad movement in the city of Baalbek, eastern Lebanon, in the early hours of Monday morning. Official sources reported that a guided missile hit a residential apartment inhabited by a Palestinian family on the southern outskirts of the city, leading to the destruction of large parts of the targeted building.

The airstrike resulted in the martyrdom of leader Wael Abdel Halim and his 17-year-old daughter, Rama, while ambulance and civil defense teams continue search operations under the rubble. This operation comes at a time when no official comment has been issued by the Islamic Jihad movement regarding the details of the assassination or the nature of the tasks Abdel Halim was performing.

This attack represents a serious breach of the ceasefire agreement that came into effect last April and was recently extended for an additional 45 days until early July. Concerns are growing about the collapse of the fragile calm amid repeated Israeli targeting of various Lebanese areas during the past twenty-four hours.

Sunday witnessed a bloody escalation, as Israeli forces killed at least nine people and wounded about 18 others in a series of field violations. Reports from the field confirm that the occupation army continues to target Palestinian and Lebanese resistance cadres despite international understandings aimed at stopping military operations.

Since the start of the extensive Israeli offensive on Lebanese territories in March 2026, the Lebanese Ministry of Health has recorded the killing of 2,988 people and the injury of more than nine thousand others. The ongoing military operations have also caused the displacement of more than one million citizens from their villages and cities, amid extremely complex humanitarian conditions in shelters.

The targeting led to the martyrdom of the leader in the Islamic Jihad movement, Wael Abdel Halim, and his young daughter, Rama, and rescue teams are still working at the scene.