Samir Kuntar, a Hezbollah commander who became a hero in the Middle East after allegedly murdering a 4-year-old Israeli Jewish girl, has reportedly been killed in an Israeli Air Force strike on his position in Syria.
Kuntar, who received awards from the Iranian regime and Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad for murdering the 4-year-old and her father, was neutralized when an Israeli air strike connected with his vehicle. He was riding along with five militants fighting on behalf of the Assad regime, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported.
“An Israeli plane hit a car inside the town of Hader, killing two men from Hezbollah, and three men from the pro-regime popular committees in the town,” Rami Abdel Rahman, the director of the Observatory, said on Wednesday.
In 1979, the Lebanese-born Kuntar snuck into Israel by taking a boat to the coastal city of Nahariya, which lies just 5 miles from the Lebanon-border. From there, he led three fellow jihadis in an attempt to kidnap an Israeli family and bring them back to Lebanon. When it became clear that they were not going to be able to execute the plan, Kuntar proceeded to kill four-year-old Einat Haran and her father, 31-year-old Danny Haran, according to Israel’s account of what unfolded.
Although he was sentenced with five life-sentences, and spent 29 years in Israeli prison, Kuntar was ultimately freed in a 2008 prisoner exchange with Hezbollah militants. Shortly thereafter, he became a Hezbollah commander responsible for supporting the Assad regime in Hader, Syria.