BEIRUT, May 15, 2024 (BSS/Xinhua) -A commander of the Lebanese armed group Hezbollah commander was killed and his assistant wounded Tuesday night in an Israeli airstrike targeting their civilian car in southwest Lebanon, according to Lebanese military sources.

The sources, who spoke anonymously, said that an Israeli drone fired three air-to-surface missiles at the car on the road linking the town of Al-Haouch to the city of Tyre, burning the car and killing one person inside it and wounding the other.

The deceased was a field commander in Hezbollah called Hussein Ibrahim Makki, while his assistant's name is Baqir Hamoudi, according to the sources.

They added that members of the Civil Defense worked to extinguish the fire that broke out in the car and transported the casualties to a hospital in Tyre.

Tensions along the Lebanon-Israel border escalated on Oct. 8, 2023, following a barrage of rockets launched by Hezbollah toward Israel in solidarity with Hamas' attack on Israel the day before. Israel retaliated by firing heavy artillery toward southeastern Lebanon.