Special to WorldTribune.com

NICOSIA — A Hizbullah commander wanted by the United States has been killed in the Sunni revolt in Syria.

Islamist sources said Fawzi Ayoub was killed in a battle with Sunni rebels on May 26.

Ayoub was said to have lived in Canada and was on the FBI’s most-wanted list in the United States.

“We are proud that our commanders are among American intelligence’s top
most wanted,” the Hizbullah-linked Mouqawama Twitter account said.
“The land of the Levant has been watered with the noblest blood.”

Opposition sources said the 48-year-old Ayoub was killed in an ambush by
the Free Syrian Army in Aleppo in late May. They said Ayoub led a Hizbullah
unit that fought with militias of the regime of President Bashar Assad.

In 2009, a U.S. court indicted Ayoub on charges of trying to enter
Israel and bomb an unspecified civilian target for Hizbullah. Earlier, Ayoub
spent two years in an Israeli jail until he was released in a prisoner
exchange in 2004.

Another report said Ayoub led a Hizbullah unit that fought U.S.-trained
Sunni rebels in the southern Syrian city in Nawa. No further details were
available.

Hizbullah has played a leading role in Assad’s war against Sunni rebels.
The sources said Hizbullah has deployed between 5,000 and 8,000 troops in
Syria.

The Syrian military has focused operations on the northern city of
Aleppo. On May 28, the opposition Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said
more than 40 people were killed in Syrian Air Force strikes on eastern
Aleppo.

“The helicopters dropped barrel bombs on the Sheik Fares and Sheik
Khader neighborhoods which caused the death of a woman in Sheik
Fares, while others were injured,” Syrian Observatory said.

  Aleppo, Fawzi Ayoub, Free Syrian Army, Hizbullah commander on FBI’s most-wanted list killed by Syrian rebels