People watch Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah delivering a televised address, as they sit at a cafe in Sour, southern Lebanon, on Aug. 25, 2024. (Credit: Aziz Taher/Reuters)
BEIRUT — “If you aren’t from the south or a resident of Dahiyeh [Beirut's southern suburbs], you wouldn’t know what it feels like for Israel to attack you in every imaginable way while you didn’t have a single bullet to defend yourself. So, of course, you would view yesterday’s response as an adequate response,” said 79-year-old supermarket owner Hassan Kanj from the neighborhood of Chiyah.
His comments came one day after Hezbollah’s long-awaited retaliation against Israel in response to the assassination of one of the party’s top military leaders, Fouad Shukur, on July 30, in Haret Hreik, a neighborhood in Beirut's southern suburbs. The strike killed Shukur, three women and two children and injured at least 80 people. Israel claimed the strike was in response to the killing of 12 children in the village of Majdal Shams in the Israeli-occupied Syrian Golan Heights which it blamed on Hezbollah — a charge that the party strongly denied.
'A victory'
"When I was growing up, it was known that Israel could murder, jail, bomb and starve us without anyone firing a single bullet to deter it; so I see yesterday's response as a victory, and I'm overjoyed with it," Kanj said.
Sitting in his supermarket, cigarette in hand, Kanj remembered when “Israel did not know what it meant to be so heavily attacked from its north."
"Witnessing an attack on Israel, deterring it from invading the country like it so easily did in 1982 — it’s indescribable. Unthinkable for a man who lived through Israel's past actions that warrant it of being attacked and deterred,” he said, tears welling up.
“I’m thankful that I live in the era of the Sayyed,” he stated, referring to Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah.
As Kanj shared his thoughts with L’Orient Today, Rami Said, a customer buying cigarettes, interjected, “In the end, it is only innocent civilians who pay the ultimate price, that’s all I want to say about his speech."
“Whatever the end result of this war is, we are still left with hundreds killed in Lebanon, thousands of houses turned to rubble in the south, tens and thousands displaced,” he continued before abruptly leaving the shop.
The conflict between Hezbollah and Israel in southern Lebanon, which began ten months ago on Oct. 8, a day after the "Al-Aqsa Flood" operation by Hamas against Israel, has displaced over 110,000 people, according to an Aug. 13 report by the International Organization for Migration (IOM).
The organization estimates that $110 million is needed to meet the needs of those affected by the ongoing violence.
Hezbollah launched hundreds of rockets and drones at Israel early on Sunday morning in an attack it claimed was retaliation for Shukur's killing.
Israel’s military said it struck Hezbollah military sites "preemptively" that night with around 100 jets to thwart a larger attack by the party.
In a speech on Sunday afternoon, Nasrallah said the barrage had been completed “as planned.” Nasrallah insisted Hezbollah sought to avoid Israeli civilian targets or infrastructure in its attack.
However, the group would assess the impact of its strikes, and “if the result is not enough, then we retain the right to respond another time,” he added. Nasrallah pointed out that Hezbollah had delayed its retaliation to give time for cease-fire talks, and revised its attack to avoid triggering a full-scale war.
After his speech, Hezbollah supporters in Beirut's southern suburbs and several villages and towns in the south took to the streets, raising the Lebanese flag and the party's flag, and rejoiced at the attack against Israel.
احتفالات في الضاحية الجنوبية ببيروت لرد حزب الله على اغتيال فؤاد شكر اليوم. #خبرني pic.twitter.com/OSMg2BPFtF
— خبرني - khaberni (@khaberni) August 25, 2024
‘We are dealing with Israel, the human monster’
“I wanted Hezbollah to attack Israel more harshly. After all, the Israeli strike on the southern suburbs of Beirut last month was massive,” said Karim Hamieh, a digital marketing consultant in his late 20s, over the phone.
His statement reflects the sentiments of some who had waited nearly a month for a retaliation that sparked widespread speculation about whether it would escalate into a nationwide war.
“If Hezbollah struck Eilat [a southern Israeli port and resort town on the Red Sea] or Tel Aviv, Israel would have retaliated and launched us into a nationwide war, 'returning Lebanon to the Stone Age' as they repeatedly threatened,” said Qassem Kheireddine, a clothes shop owner in Beer al-Abed, a neighborhood in the southern suburbs of Beirut, referencing Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant’s repeated warnings of severe retaliation that would “completely damage Lebanon’s infrastructure like never before.”
"Then, the same people calling Sunday's response mild would blame Hezbollah for sending us into that war," he continued. "We wouldn't hear the end of it."
“We are dealing with Israel, the human monster, so of course retaliations are carefully calculated,” he concluded.
Since Oct.7, Israel's war on Gaza has killed 40,435 people, mostly civilians, including over 16,000 children. In Lebanon, Israeli strikes have killed 597 people, including 109 civilians.
‘I wanted to see Tel Aviv burn; but I trust the Sayyed’s calculations’
Still, many echo Hamieh's belief that Hezbollah' retaliation should have been stronger. “I wanted to see Tel Aviv burn just like Dahieh [the southern suburbs of Beirut] was on fire the day that Israel, may God eternally curse it, assassinated Hajj Fouad [Shukur]. I especially wanted Hezbollah to avenge the killing of the two kids,” said Haneen Srour, a school teacher and resident of Beer al-Abed, angrily.
The killing of Amira Fadlallah, 6, and her brother Hassan Fadlallah, 10, who were found hugging each other under the rubble of their apartment in the targeted building, caused widespread grief in the country as their photos circulated on social media.
Reflecting on her anger, Srour added, “In the end, I’m not a military expert, I’m a citizen speaking emotionally, so I would leave military decisions and analysis to experts. I fully trust the Sayyed’s calculations.”
Others saw Hezbollah’s measured response as a sign of “weakness.”
Political activist Karim Safieddine took to X (formerly Twitter) after Nasrallah’s speech, writing that the Hezbollah chief’s “admission of Israel’s military readiness, and his insistence on a limited response, are all evidence of the defensive, military, and institutional weakness we are experiencing today, and of the great danger facing the south and the rest of the country in the coming years.”
خطاب السيد حسن، وسرده المفصّل، وتغييبه للنتيجة اللي كان مفروض نسمعها، واعترافه بالجهوزية العسكرية عند إسرائيل، وتمسّكه بالردّ المحدود، كلها دلائل على الضعف الدفاعي والعسكري والمؤسساتي اللي عم نعيشه اليوم، وعلى الخطر الكبير أمام الجنوب وباقي البلد بالسنين الجاية.
— Karim Safieddine - كريم صفي الدين (@safieddine00) August 25, 2024