Israeli bomb fragments found at site of Kuntar assassination: media

Lebanese media reported Monday that evidence was found linking Israel to Saturday's airstrike in Damascus that killed Lebanese militant leader Samir Kuntar.

The Lebanese daily As-Safir, a Hezbollah- linked newspaper, reported that warheads from smart bombs featuring Israeli markings were found among the rubble of the building where Kuntar and eight others were killed.

---

According to the report, Russian radar systems located in southern Syria had identified two Israeli F-15 fighter jets over the Kineret, also known as the Sea of Galilee, which carried out the pinpoint attack without crossing the border.

In November Defense Minister Moshe "Boogie" Ya'alon insisted that Russia is aware that Israel may carry out airstrikes in Syria and that Moscow is committed to allowing Israel to take any necessary actions.

"Under the agreements we have with the Russians, they act in accordance with their interests; we act in accordance with our interests; and the one doesn’t bother the other," he said.

Yaalon explained that Israel and Russia had made arrangements to avoid clashes over Syria, with the agreement said to include a "hotline" and information sharing.

Since the beginning of the bloody civil war in 2011, Israel is reported to have attacked Syrian military bases on a number of occasions, including raids reportedly targeting Iranian rockets bound for Hezbollah in Lebanon.

Hezbollah vows revenge

During the funeral for Samir Kuntar Monday, Hezbollah leaders vowed to take revenge on Israel for his assignation, the Israeli news site Ynet News reported.

"The Israeli enemy will regret the assassination of Samir Kuntar," Omar al-Mussawi, head of Hezbollah's foreign relations said at the funeral.

Kuntar was allegedly killed in an airstrike in Damascus attributed to the Israeli air force on Saturday night.

Senior Hezbollah militants, Lebanese politicians and leaders of Palestinian factions were joined by thousands of civilians at the funeral in Beirut. Even the Lebanese Prime Minister Tammam Salam, sent his condolences to Kuntar's family and Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah's aide.

According to Ynet, head of Hezbollah's Executive Assembly, Hashim Safi Al Din said that "Samir Kuntar was made for Palestine and he died a martyr for it."

"If the Israeli thinks he settled the score with Kuntar's assassination, then he is wrong. He knows he only set new scores," he continued.

"If Israel hasn't learned from all of its failed attempts to assassinate senior commanders, then it ought to know it committed a new stupid act by assassinating Kuntar," he added and vowed that "only days separate us to the Israeli enemy."

Draped in a Hezbollah flag, Kuntar's coffin was escorted by a procession which began at a prayer house in a southern suburb of Beirut and ended at the "Two Martyrs" cemetery, which is dedicated solely to Hezbollah militants. Other well-known militants buried at this cemetery include Imad Mughniyah and his son Jihad, both assassinated in Syria.

A thick crowd chanted "Death to Israel! Death to America!" and waved the Palestinian, Lebanese and Hezbollah flags, as the coffin was carried to a mausoleum reserved for "martyrs".

Hezbollah had announced Kuntar's death on Sunday claiming that two Israeli planes penetrated Syrian airspace and fired four missiles at a building which he was inside. At least eight others have been reported killed in the attack.

“At 10:15 p.m. on Saturday December 19, Zionist warplanes struck a residential building in Jaramana city in Damascus countryside,” Hezbollah media relations said in the statement.

Israel has not acknowledged responsibility for the incident, however fighters claiming to be from the Free Syrian Army uploaded a video on YouTube Monday, in which they claimed that they were responsible for the assassination of Samir Kuntar and his bodyguards.

Kuntar spent 29 years in Israeli custody over his role in the brutal slaying of four Israelis as part of a group which carried out a terror raid from Lebanon in 1979 on the northern Israeli town of Nahariya. Kuntar killed Danny Haran before killing Haran's four-year-old daughter Einat by smashing her head with the butt of his rifle. Einat's mother, Smadar, accidentally smothered her two-year-old daughter Yael while trying to keep her quiet as they hid from the terrorists. The group of attackers also killed policeman Eliyahu Shahar.

Kuntar was released in 2008 as part of a prisoner swap with the Lebanese Shi'ite Hezbollah group for the bodies of IDF soldiers Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser.

A day after rocket and artillery fire was traded over the border with Israel, Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah was later Monday to give an address on the killing of Kantar, who commanded operations for the group in Syria's occupied Golan.