Hezbollah denied Sunday Israeli reports that its leader Hassan Nasrallah had been wounded in a Beirut air raid. "We deny categorically that Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah has been injured," a Hezbollah official said following the Israeli media reports. "This is mere Israel propaganda." Israel's privately run Channel Two television had reported that Nasrallah had been wounded in the latest raid. Israeli government ministers have made no bones about their desire to see the Hezbollah leader eliminated. "He can benefit from no immunity. We will wipe him out at the first opportunity. That's why he had better pray to Allah," Zeev Boim, minister for immigration and an ally of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, said Saturday.
General Gadi Eisenkraut, operations chief at Israel's central command, told army radio the military was checking the reports that Nasrallah had been hurt. "According to our evaluations, he was in a bunker several dozen metres underground in the Dahiya neighbourhood," the general said. Army radio reported that analyses of Nasrallah's voice in recent telephone conversations suggested "very high tension" and "psychological distress". The radio charged that he had not been seen in public since last Wednesday. Questioned on public radio, another Israeli general, Yonantan Locker, confirmed the air force had the capability to "destroy bunkers". "We have already done it and we will continue to do it," he said, declining to comment on Nasrallah's health or whereabouts.