The Islamic Group, also known as Jamaa Islamiya (JI), says its headquarters in Sidon, south of Beirut, was targeted by the IDF. According to “The enemy’s destruction of our headquarters in Sidon will only increase our attachment to our land,” Beirut-based newspaper Al Akhbar, which is pro-Iranian, reported.
JI’s center in Sidon was subjected to “a brutal Zionist aggression by warplanes, which led to its destruction without any prior warning,” the report said. “Divine providence prevented any loss of life after the leadership’s decision to evacuate the center in anticipation of the enemy’s treachery.”
JI, a Sunni Islamist political party in Lebanon, was founded in 1964 and is linked to the Muslim Brotherhood. It has also worked alongside Hezbollah, which is Shi’ite. “Israeli strike targets Muslim Brotherhood headquarters in Sidon, Lebanon,” UAE-based news site Al-Ain News reported.
“The southern Lebanese city of Sidon witnessed a major Israeli escalation with continued airstrikes and evacuation orders,” the report said.
Israel had issued evacuation orders “preceded by an air raid targeting a center belonging to the Islamic Group in Al-Bustan Al-Kabir neighborhood,” it said, adding that the IDF had warned about Hezbollah military infrastructure in the city.
Al-Ain News cited a post on March 3 by the IDF’s Arabic-language spokesperson, which showed a map of a building in Sidon.
“The statement called on residents of the building identified on an attached map and neighboring buildings to evacuate immediately and move at least 300 meters away, warning that remaining at the site would put them at risk,” Al-Ain News reported.
The IDF statement, which was posted just after 5:30 p.m., said in Arabic: “The Israel Defense Forces will attack Hezbollah military infrastructure in the near term due to its prohibited attempts to rebuild its activities in the area.”
The IDF strikes hit “the Islamic Group’s center (the Muslim Brotherhood headquarters) in the Bustan al-Kabir neighborhood of Sidon,” Al-Ain News reported. “The extent of the damage and whether there were any injuries is still unclear, while security tensions prevail in the city amid an exodus from the vicinity of the targeted site.”
“For decades, it has adopted positions and alliances similar to those of the Muslim Brotherhood branches in the region, and it is considered part of the broader Muslim Brotherhood network, according to research studies issued by the Washington Institute for Near East Policy,” the report said. “The administration of US President Donald Trump classified it as one of three branches of the Muslim Brotherhood in the Middle East, designating it as a terrorist organization, and imposed sanctions on it and its members.”
London-based newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat reported: “Israel struck a headquarters belonging to the Jamaa Islamiya group, an ally of Hamas and Hezbollah, in the southern Lebanese city of Sidon on Tuesday, state media reported.”
The IDF said in the evening of March 3: “Among the targets struck were weapons storage facilities, missile launchers, command centers, and a number of terrorist infrastructure sites belonging to the Hezbollah and Hamas terrorist organizations in areas of Tyre and Sidon in southern Lebanon. The infrastructure sites were used by the terrorist organizations to advance and carry out various terror attacks against IDF troops and Israeli civilians.”
Statement does not mention JI
The statement did not mention the Islamic Group.
The IDF had targeted JI in the past, Ynet reported in February.
“The IDF said a senior Jamaa Islamiya terrorist was arrested near Mount Dov after an intelligence-led raid,” the report said.
The following day, “IDF troops completed an overnight operation to locate and dismantle a weapons storage facility belonging to the Jamaa Islamiya terrorist organization in the Beit Jinn area in southern Syria,” Ynet reported.
Last April, the IDF said: “The IAF struck in the area of Haret en Naameh in Lebanon and eliminated Hussein Izzat Mohammad Atwi, a significant terrorist in the Jamaa Islamiya terrorist organization, who is also affiliated with the Hamas terrorist organization in Lebanon.”