Saleh al-Arouri, deputy chairman of Hamas’ political bureau, was eliminated Tuesday night by a UAV which hit him directly, Lebanon's Nidaa Aloutan newspaper reported Wednesday.
Al-Arouri was hit by the missile as he entered his vehicle, after leaving a meeting in a building in the Dahieh neighborhood, near the Hadi Nasrallah highway.
The report also said that al-Arouri's office was also hit by missiles.
Currently, the estimate in Israel is that despite the fact that al-Arouri was assassinated in the heart of Dahieh, Hezbollah will avoid escalating the conflict with Israel.
The New York Times reported that though Israeli sources did not comment on the assassination, American and Lebanese officials have attributed the attack to Israel. A senior American official said that in his estimation, this is the first of several such attacks against those responsible for the October 7 attack.
The official also claimed that no one knows for certain if al-Arouri took part in planning or carrying out the attack, but that this is "just the beginning" and is expected to continue for several years.
Among other terror incidents, al-Arouri, who was responsible for terror activities in Judea and Samaria, planned the kidnapping and murder of three teenage boys, Gilad Sha'er, Naftali Fraenkel, and Eyal Yifrah, in the summer of 2014, sparking Operation Protective Edge.
The three teens were abducted and murdered in June 2014 by Hamas terrorists Marwan Kawasmeh and Amer Abu Eisha of Hevron. The bodies were found eighteen days later, bound and buried in a shallow grave in a field, and the terrorists were later eliminated in a shootout with police.