Hezbollah replaces top security official Wafiq Safa as part of internal restructuring

BEIRUT (AP) — Hezbollah has replaced a top security official who was in charge of coordination with Lebanon’s security agencies after he told the group’s leadership that he wants to step down, two officials with the group who were not authorized to speak publicly on the matter said Friday.

Wafiq Safa had headed Hezbollah’s Liaison and Coordination Unit for decades and it was not immediately clear what his new job within the Iran-backed group is going to be. Hezbollah’s leadership accepted Safa’s resignation Friday, one of the officials said.

The other Hezbollah official said that Safa was replaced by Hussein Abdullah, who is not publicly known. The official added that the Liaison and Coordination Unit was recently stripped of some of its powers that were given to other departments within the group.

The move comes as Hezbollah is conducting some restructuring within its ranks after its 14-month war with Israel that weakened the group and killed much of its political and military leadership.

Lebanese media had reported that Safa was a target of Israeli airstrikes in central Beirut in October 2024 at the height of the latest Israel-Hezbollah war. He later made several public appearances and appeared unscathed.

Safa is one of the most known faces of Hezbollah and had led indirect negotiations in the past for prisoners exchanges between the group and Israel, the biggest of which were in 2004 and 2008. He also mediated in other cases related to the group.

Safa reportedly threatened the Lebanese judge investigating the massive Beirut port blast in 2020, one of the largest non-nuclear explosions ever recorded.

In 2019, the Treasury Department targeted Safa and two Hezbollah legislators with sanctions.

Safa was reportedly born in 1960 in the village of Zebdine, near the southern city of Nabatieh. He joined Hezbollah at a young age and remains with group.

The latest Israel-Hezbollah war began Oct. 8, 2023, a day after Hamas attacked southern Israel, when Hezbollah fired rockets into Israel in solidarity with Hamas. Israel launched a widespread bombardment of Lebanon in September 2024 that severely weakened Hezbollah, followed by a ground invasion.