BEIRUT, July 19 (AFP) - A military commander of the Shiite Muslim movement Hezbollah was killed Monday in a Beirut car bomb blast allegedly claimed by a rival Sunni group, but blamed on archfoe Israel.
The attack in the rundown southern suburbs of the capital on Ghaleb Awwali, a senior member of the group's military wing Islamic Resistance, was the first targeted killing of a Hezbollah militant in months.
Officials from both Hezbollah and Lebanon, which remains technically at war with Israel, pointed the finger at the Jewish state as militants vowed revenge.
A statement by a shadowy Sunni Muslim group called Jund Ash Sham (Soldiers of Damascus) said the bombing was part of a plan to eradicate Shiite "heresy," but a man claiming to be the group's leader later denied any involvement.
"This statement is a fabrication. We have nothing to do with this operation... and the first party to benefit from it is the Mossad Israeli intelligence agency," Abu Yussef al-Sharqiyeh told AFP.
The group's offices could not be reached for clarification.
Hezbollah also blamed Israel, dismissing the Sunni group's statement and the assassination itself as "enemy" attempts to stir discord.
"The Zionist enemy is behind this act that targets the resistance and one of its symbols, as well as the security and stability in Lebanon," Sheikh Hassan Ezzedin, head of the Hezbollah information office, told AFP.
"This act was carried out by the Zionist enemy's security and intelligence services and networks, and the enemy should bear full responsibility for what it has done," he warned.
A senior Lebanese security source also pointed an accusing finger at "networks linked to Israel."
The attack took place as Awwali was leaving his home on Moawad street, one of the main commercial areas of the relatively impoverished southern suburbs of the Lebanese capital which remain a key Hezbollah stronghold.
The Islamic Resistance is the military arm of Hezbollah which waged a guerrilla war that was instrumental in leading to Israel's May 2000 troop pullout from southern Lebanon after 22 years of occupation.
"Yet another time, the Zionist enemy, through its services and agents, has targeted a mujahed (fighter) of the Islamic Resistance," Hezbollah said in a statement.
"The blood of our dear martyr Ghaleb Awwali will be avenged...and the Zionists will discover that they have committed a big stupidity that they will regret."
Jund Ash Sham, which announced its formation a few weeks ago in the Palestinian refugee camp of Ain al-Helweh, issued a statement claiming responsiblity.
It was the first time that a Sunni group has allegedly claimed an attack on a rival figure in Lebanon's Shiite community, the largest in the country.
"We have executed one of the symbols of treachery, the Shiite Ghaleb Awwali," said Jund Ash-Sham, which refers to Damascus at the time of the seventh century Ommayyad Islamic califate.
"This is the start of a real and decisive battle between Islam and heresy," said the group.
Jund Ash-Sham is a splinter group of Osbat al-Nour, a tiny group that sought refuge in the Palestinian refugee camp in Ain al-Helweh after deadly armed clashes with the Lebanese army in northern Lebanon, in January 2000.
The grouping is made up of mostly Sunni fundamentalist Palestinians, and some Lebanese from fundamentalist circles that oppose Shiite, particularly the Islamic republic of Iran.
Considered more radical than Palestinian groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad, Jund Ash Sham also opposes all other secular and nationalist Palestinian movements.
Ain al-Helweh, the largest of Lebanon's 12 Palestinian refugee camps, remains off limits to the Lebanese army.
Awwali's killing was the first assassination of a Hezbollah member since last year when Islamic Resistance member Ali al-Saleh was killed in a similar car bombing in Beirut's southern suburbs.
A funeral will be held for Awwali in a mosque at the southern suburbs later Monday, with prayers led by Hezbollah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah. He will be later buried in his native Tulin in southern Lebanon.