Imad Mughniyah

JAFFA, Israel – A representative of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas praised Hezbollah deputy commander Imad Mughniyah as a hero after the report today of the most-wanted terrorist leader's death in a car bomb blast in Syria.

Abbas Zakki, the ambassador to Lebanon for the PA president's Fatah organization, called Mughniyah a "hero and a loss for the Palestinian people and the Muslim nation."

"We mourn with our brothers in Hezbollah this great leader who died today," Zakki said on Hezbollah's Al Manar TV as screened and translated by WND.

Zakki said he is "proud that Mughniyah was part of the Fatah revolutionary movement and that he fought Western Zionist and American imperialism as part of Fatah."

In the 1980s, Mughniyah was in Beirut working with Fatah and its leader at the time, Yasser Arafat.

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Mughniyah was responsible for numerous infamous deadly attacks against the U.S. and Israel, including involvement in the 1983 bombing of a U.S. Marine barracks in Lebanon.

He was Israel's No. 1 most-wanted terrorist, even ahead of Hezbollah chieftain Hassan Nasrallah. Mughniyah was considered one of the most dangerous terrorists in the world by Western intelligence agencies. He led Hezbollah's "international terror branch," directly orchestrating attacks against foreign targets, according to Israeli security officials. He was widely considered Nasrallah's successor.

Mughniyah was accused of helping to plan the 1983 Marine barracks attack in which 300 were killed and also the bombing of the U.S. Embassy in Beirut the same year, which killed 63 people.

He was responsible for the 1985 hijacking of a TWA passenger jet and the murder of one of its passengers, a soldier in the U.S. Navy. Mughniyah was indicted for the 1994 bombing of a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires killing 85 people. A warrant was issued for his arrest for the 1992 bombing of the Israeli Embassy also in Buenos Aires in which 29 people died. Argentinean officials have publicly pointed a finger at Iran for aiding in those attacks.

Also serving as commander of Islamic Jihad in the 1980's, Mughniyah is accused of kidnapped dozens of Western hostages, including Americans, killing some of them, such as the CIA's Middle East station chief.

Hezbollah issued a statement declaring, "With all pride we declare a great jihadist leader of the Islamic resistance in Lebanon joining the martyrs."

Danny Yatom, a former Mossad chief and current Knesset member, said Mughniyah's death was "a great achievement for the free world in its fight on terror. Mughniyah was one of the most dangerous and cruel terrorists of all time.

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