Beirut – On a Friday evening in September, a squadron of Israeli fighter planes stretched through the Heaven of Lebanon and let the Hisbollah-Dominated suburbs south of the capital, about 85 tons in Daisy-Chained, bunker bombs.
The rockets stabbed deep into the ground and triggered two city blocks together with their destination: Hisbollah's underground headquarters, in which Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of the group and a longstanding nemesis for Israel, met with his lieutenants. He was soon declared dead.
On Sunday, almost five months later, tens of thousands met near this point in Dahieh for the funeral of their fallen leader and took part in a complex show of the defiance to prove that the group supported by Iran, although he was involved in his war Israel was not injured.
On Sunday morning, Beirut's streets with Lebanese troops and police officers flew to manage the traffic that was burried by masses of mourning to start the capital of the capital at the start of an hourly commemoration.
They passed the stadium past two -story high -banners, which put a smiling Nasrallah on next to his cousin and the designated successor Haschem Safeddine, which was killed in a separate Israeli air raid. Many wore Lebanese or the yellow-on-green flags of the HISBOLLAH. Others raised posters of some of their relatives who had been killed in the war. Long before noon, the stadium – which is a capacity of more than 50,000, was the largest Lebanon.
One of those present was Khawlah Ahmad Tlais, a 36-year-old who lost 12 family members in the war.
“It is 13 with the Sayed,” refers to Nasrallah with an honor. He is also part of my family, ”she said and stopped a poster with pictures of her late relatives, with Nasrallah taking the top position.
Among those who lost her, her brother, a HISBOLLAH commander, who she said, was returning home on the eve of the ceasefire who was positioned in November. An Israeli strike aimed at his house and killed him together with his parents, nephews and other relatives of Tlais. Tlais' at home was also destroyed.
“I am proud that I sacrificed that I gave for this way,” she said, her voice dark but firm.
“Those who do not understand why we like to do this do not understand our cause. We say our statement that they taught us to live in dignity, but they did not teach us how we should live without them. “
The war with Israel began last October, when the Hisbollah began a rocket campaign in northern Israel to support its allies, the Palestinian group Hamas, after their attack on South Israel on October 7. Months of Tit-for-Tat strikes followed, and tens of thousands of people on both sides of the border between Lebanon Israel.
The hostilities escalated in September, when Israel punished air raids and then an invasion of the South Libanonic slump. When the ceasefire was forged, the number of fatalities in Lebanon was almost 4,000, although, according to the Lebanese authorities, more than four times were injured, which said that most of the civilian victims were.
Since then, the Israel army forces have withdrawn from the largest part of the South Libanon, apart from five hill positions near the border; His Air Force continues to hammer what she says, the Hisbollah targets. During the funeral, the Israeli military led air raids in the South Libanon and in the Bekaa valley in the east of the country.
The Hisbollah is said to have lost thousands of their squads, including the upper seasons of their military leadership and a significant part of its arsenal in battle. Many in Lebanon see the group as a mortal blow, but their leaders insist that their survival point proves something else.
“The resistance remains and is strong and continues,” said Naim al-Qassem, the new leader of the group, in a television speech.
It was a message that was resonance with the supporters of the group.
“Just look around you, with everyone who gather and our presence here is the victory” decorated with Hisbollah's insignia. On her lapel there was a pin with the face of Ali Dhawi, her stepson, a Hezbollah operative who was killed in an Israeli attack during the war.
Despite everything she had lost, Hamdoon was unshakable in her support for the Hisbollah; She intended that both Hassan and Mohammad were included in the group's fights.
“That's why I put them in uniform today. So people know that they are on the right track, ”she said.
With Nasrallah's funeral, the Hezbollah is putting out a figure that has indispensably shaped the faction, which he has developed over more than 30 years of his responsibility. Preparations for a massive event started weeks earlier. The Hisbollah squad raced to build a mausoleum for the internment of Nasrallah, and an organizational committee that coordinates 70 international delegations together with thousands of activists and influences on social media that are expected to take part.
One of the larger delegations came from the main patron of the Hisbollah, the Iran, who sent his Foreign Minister Abbass Aragchi and the parliamentary spokesman Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf.
“Today's funeral will show the world that the resistance lives, that the Hisbollah lives, that this people is loyal to its values and that the path of resistance continues,” said Aragchi. He referred to the so-called axis of resistance, the network of paramilitary factions from Iran, the Lebanon, Iraq, Yemen, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Gaza against the USA and Israel.
“Sayed Hassan was over first place. He was a spike in the eye of Israel and the United States, ”said Adel, a 34-year-old Iraq with a paramilitary faction one of thousands of Iraqis who had flown to the Baghdad ceremony. He only gave his first name to avoid harassment.
“He was a figure not only for Lebanon, but the whole world. When we heard about his martyrdom, we were all affected. “
In the course of the afternoon, a platform with the coffins of Nasrallah and Safeddine made themselves through the crowd, with many scarves, pieces of fabric and souvenirs to the companions they touched the coffins before they throw them back.
At one point, a quartet of Israeli fighter planes roared before the fire against the sea above the stadium – a “clear message” according to an explanation of X from the Israel Defense Minister Israel Katz that “whoever to destroy Israel and attack Israel – – that – that – the – that – the – – that – the – that – the – that – that – that – the – that – the – that – that – the – That – that – that – will be the end of him.
“You will specialize in funerals – and we will specialize in victories,” he wrote.
Despite the rhetoric of the Hezbollah, the funeral takes place at a delicate time for the group, which had cultivated a touch of invincibility as a Lebanese political parliamentary group before the war and a fighting force that was considered superior to the Lebanese army.
Hisbollah's opponent in Lebanon, which was beaten by the war, now spy on the opportunity to break what they say is the group's strangling area about the state. In the past few weeks, anti-Hezbollah parties have been working together to choose a president and prime minister who campaigned for a group of the group to reveal the group and remove their arsenal.
“The Lebanon is fed up with the wars of others in his country,” said Lebanese President Joseph Aoun in a meeting with the parliamentary spokesman Qalibaf on Sunday, according to a Lebanese state news. He emphasized the non -interference in matters of other countries.
Hisbollah's al-Qassem said that those who concentrate on the supposed weakness of the group are wrong. Although the Lebanese government was waiting for a complete Israeli withdrawal with diplomatic means, the Hisbollah would still fight if the need arose.
“The resistance is still present and strong in numbers and weapons,” he said.
“The inevitable victory comes.”