The head of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps elite Quds Force is under house arrest as the Islamic Republic investigates recent security breaches surrounding the assassinations of senior Hezbollah officials, according to a Thursday report by Middle East Eye.
Sources told the U.K.-based news outlet that Brigadier General Esmail Qaani, thought to have been killed in an Israeli airstrike in Beirut last month, is being detained by the regime’s security services while it conducts a widescale counter-espionage inquiry.
Authorities in Tehran are reportedly concerned about how Jerusalem was able to locate the command structure of their Lebanese allies. They are particularly focused on the efforts that led to the September 27 aerial bombardment on Hezbollah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, and a similar incident targeting his successor, Hashem Safieddine, exactly one week later.
Individuals who spoke to MEE indicated suspicions have been directed toward Qaani since the operation eliminating Safieddine. They allege the general, who arrived in Lebanon two days after the killing of Nasrallah, was expected to attend the October 4 gathering of the militia’s Shura Council but cancelled shortly before it began. Following this, the IDF launched at least 11 consecutive bomb deployments on the location.
“Qaani was invited to this meeting, and under the current circumstances he should have been present,” a person close to Hezbollah was quoted as saying. “The breach was 100 percent Iranian, and there is no question about this part.”
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