Hezbollah replaced Wafiq Safa, the group’s longstanding security liaison and coordination official responsible for coordination with Lebanon’s security agencies, after Safa told the group’s leadership that he wanted to step down, two Hezbollah officials said Friday. The officials, who were not authorized to speak publicly about the matter, said Hezbollah leadership accepted Safa’s resignation on Friday.
The officials said Safa was heading Hezbollah’s Liaison and Coordination Unit for decades, but it was not immediately clear what new job he would take within the Iran-backed group. They also said Hezbollah replaced Safa with Hussein Abdullah, who is not publicly known, and that the unit was recently stripped of some of its powers that were transferred to other departments within Hezbollah.
The reshuffle comes as Hezbollah conducts internal restructuring after its war with Israel, a conflict that lasted about 14 months and left the group weakened. The officials said the war killed much of Hezbollah’s political and military leadership, setting the stage for changes in how the group organizes roles and authority.
Safa is one of Hezbollah’s more recognizable figures, and the officials said he had been in charge of indirect negotiations in past prisoner exchanges involving Hezbollah and Israel. Those exchanges, according to the report, included major prisoner swaps in 2004 and 2008, and Safa also mediated other cases involving the group.
Lebanese media had previously reported that Safa was a target of Israeli airstrikes in central Beirut in October 2024 at the height of the latest Israel-Hezbollah war. Despite those reports, Safa later made public appearances and appeared unscathed.
The report also said Safa was one of the officials targeted by the U.S. Treasury Department in 2019, when it imposed sanctions on him and two Hezbollah legislators. It also said Safa was reportedly born in 1960 in the village of Zebdine near Nabatieh, and that he joined Hezbollah at a young age and remains with the 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 later launched a widespread bombardment of Lebanon in September 2024 that severely weakened Hezbollah, followed by a ground invasion.