Salim Ayyash, a senior Hezbollah leader, has been killed in an Israeli airstrike on the Syrian-Lebanese border town of Qusayr, Al-Hadath channel reported, citing sources.

Ayyash, born in 1963 in the southern Lebanese town of Harouf, had long been a prominent figure within Hezbollah. He was notably convicted for his involvement in the 2005 assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, a high-profile killing that shook the Middle East and marked a pivotal moment in Lebanon's political turmoil.

In December 2020, the Special Tribunal for Lebanon, an international court established to investigate the attack, issued a verdict in absentia against Ayyash and four other Hezbollah members. They were found guilty of conspiring to commit the terrorist act that led to Hariri’s death. The tribunal charged Ayyash, along with Mustafa Badreddine, Hussein Oneissi, Hassan Habib Merhi, and Assad Sabra, with participating in a plot to assassinate Hariri, who was killed by a massive bomb explosion in Beirut on February 14, 2005.