Hezbollah Secretary General Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah, on July 10, 1992, surrounded by his supporters during the commemoration of Ashura in the southern suburbs of Beirut. Photo credit: Oussam Ayoub/Archives L'OLJ/AFP
It is 6:30 in the Lebanese capital. The southern suburb of Beirut has just been hit by the largest Israeli strike since the 2006 war. The bombs shook all of Beirut, the number of dead is unknown, there is talk of a "massacre."
Another tragedy? Perhaps the beginning of a catastrophic scenario feared for months. The wildest rumor is circulating: the Secretary-General of Hezbollah has been killed.
A few hours later, the news is confirmed. The unimaginable has happened. Hassan Nasrallah is dead, the Israeli army announced shortly after 11 a.m. No one knows what the aftermath will bring. The sudden disappearance of this mythical figure plunges the country and the region into the unknown. But a page turns tonight. Ascending to the role of party leader 32 years ago, then leading the only armed force perceived as capable of containing the Israeli enemy, he had become the face of "resistance."
With the liberation of southern Lebanon in 2000, then the July War of 2006, the man had built a small legend around his name. Both military chief, political leader, and charismatic icon, he was described as a new Nasser.
Nearly a year after the triple offensive by Hamas in Israel, the image of the "Sayyed" has yet been tested for months now. Military setbacks, security failures, the human cost of war, and the lack of a clear strategy give the impression of an organization overwhelmed, on the verge of defeat.
From one speech to another, Hassan Nasrallah tried to save face, using victorious rhetoric that put losses into perspective and emphasized tactical gains. But fewer and fewer Lebanese believed it. Especially since the sequence occurs after a grueling decade. Multiple crises, military intervention in Syria, financial scandals, the double explosion at the Beirut port, and internal power struggles have eroded the sympathy capital of Hassan Nasrallah's party.
While the leader continued to set the tone through televised speeches, followed worldwide, he no longer commanded consensus, even within the Shiite community. People in Lebanon are increasingly refusing the war-mongering of one who regularly threatened to push the country to the brink. But the image he wove, that of an unparalleled strategist, had until now survived the storms.
In 2011, the leader appeared on Time magazine's list of the 100 most influential people in the world. Loved or loathed, he is an unavoidable figures in the region. For months, the country and the region have been trying to anticipate his actions. How far will he go? Is he ready to launch into a conflict promising to be more violent and uncertain than all others? We will not know.
For the "Sayyed," the new October War was one too many, the one that deconstructed the myth shaped by all the others.
Political awakening
In the beginning was the Lebanese Civil War. The childhood and adolescence of the Sayyed were accentuated by this conflict, which some in the Shiite community believe did not concern them.
Young Hassan was only fifteen when hostilities break out. The Nasrallahs lived in Nabaa, a popular neighborhood in the eastern suburbs of Beirut that was prone to violence even before the official start of the clashes. The family was forced to flee first in 1974 and again in 1975 when Christian militias expelled Muslim residents from the Sin el-Fil area where the family had found refuge a year earlier.
They settled this time in the South, in the small village of al-Bazouryieh, near Sour, where his father, Abdel Karim, had his roots. The early years of the war were mainly those of political awakening. From his adolescence, Hassan Nasrallah sided with the Shiite clerics close to the Iranian revolutionaries, opposed to the leftist secular forces, both Lebanese and Palestinian.
In al-Bazouryieh, these forces "were very strong ... there were no fervent believers ... my main interest, therefore, revolved around forming such a group of young religious people," Nasrallah told Nida al-Watan in 1993. The young man's environment was not inclined to public affairs nor was it a particularly religiously devout one.
However, it was imbued with a Shiite culture characterized by a feeling of exclusion and injustice. The historically marginalized community had Moussa Sadr as its spokesperson at the time and Hassan Nasrallah would later confide to having meditated for long hours before the portrait of the imam that hung at the entrance of his father's shop. "I dreamed of becoming like him," he would say in an interview published by the Iranian weekly Ya Lesarat al-Hoseyn on Aug. 2, 2006.
Hassan Nasrallah joined the ranks of Amal as early as 1975. Founded some time earlier by Moussa Sadr in the wake of the Movement of the Deprived, the party defined itself as a Lebanese group, bearer of this emerging Shiite consciousness, but also religious — important for the young man, who showed an early religious fervor, walking kilometers on foot to pray in a mosque or to find second-hand books.
The Israeli invasion of 1982 marked a turning point in the life of the community and the man. While Nabih Berri, head of the party since 1980, chose to participate in the national salvation committee alongside Bashir Gemayel, a branch of the party apparatus led by Hussein al-Moussawi founded, with the support of the Islamic Republic of Iran, what would become, two years later, "Hezbollah."
From July, Hassan Nasrallah joined "the first cohort of young Shiites trained at the Janta camp in the Beqaa, under the supervision of the Iranian Pasdaran," notes Aurélie Daher, a lecturer-researcher at the University of Paris-Dauphine. The Islamic Resistance in Lebanon is born. It will become a full-fledged actor in the Lebanese conflict while maintaining an organic link — both ideological, religious, military, and financial — with the Iranian mothership.
For the young man, then 22 years old, political commitment now surpassed all other engagements. "After 1982, our youth, our life, and our time are integrated into Hezbollah," he said in an interview with Nida al-Watan on Aug. 31, 1993. The coming decade would be one of meteoric rise within the militia party.
In 1987, at 27, Hassan Nasrallah was appointed president of the executive council within the highest authority of the organization: the Consultative Council (Shura). Throughout the Lebanese conflict, his participation in armed combat seemed limited. While he had been among the leading cadres since the mid-1980s, the activist was more often described as a manager rather than a man on the field.
"He oversees military affairs, but his function is primarily political: he is not a fighter in the traditional sense," explains Kassem Kassir, a political analyst close to the party of God. The role he played during the years of conflict between Amal and Hezbollah (1988-1990) is, however, less clear.
"It is almost certain that he did not participate in the confrontations: he was then in charge of administrative responsibilities within the party," says Aurélie Daher. But a shadow zone continues to hover over the exact contours of his involvement. "At the time of the Dahiyeh battle in particular, he was a military leader," explains journalist and Hezbollah opponent Ali al-Amine. "Even though he held a political position, he maintained a direct link with the combat on the ground."
The years of 'peace'
If the years of conflict represented a sort of baptism in politics, the post-war period served as a springboard for the young leader. The assassination of the second secretary-general of the party, Abbas al-Moussawi, in an Israeli raid in February 1992 propelled him overnight to the top of the political apparatus.
The Hezbollah cadres, who did not want to give the enemy the impression of a victory, hastened the election of a successor. Some were not convinced by this young man who, at barely 31 years old, was the late leader's long-time companion and who seemed to be the favorite in Tehran. But there was limited time: Hassan Nasrallah was elected (third) Secretary-General and he remained, creating over the years a stature of a leader rarely matched in the region.
The political strategy he developed throughout the 1990s first allowed him to turn a small clandestine militia into a party that gradually integrated into the country's institutions. In this post-war period, the new secretary played the card of pacification and political normalization. He presented himself as the man of pragmatism and intra-community openness. Customs relaxed. The "Lebanization" of Hezbollah was underway and the movement got twelve deputies in the 1992 legislative elections, nine in 1996.
At the same time, the leader inaugurated a new uncompromising military line towards Israel. The end of the intra-Shiite clashes in 1990 had already allowed the party to reorient its action towards "resistance." Hassan Nasrallah reached the extent of this logic.
On Feb. 24, 1992, a week after Abbas al-Moussawi's assassination, he declares before a crowd gathered in front of a mosque in the southern suburbs that his movement is ready to "avenge" the former leader's death. He calls on "the people and the Lebanese political parties, especially Christians, to join the Resistance." The message is clear. The first salvo of Katyushas (Soviet rockets) was launched a few days later.
On the tactical level as well, a mini-revolution took place. The party preferred more sophisticated war techniques over the suicide attacks of the 1980s. The military doctrine presented by the Sayyed was intended to be hybrid. "It is based both on the observation of the Palestinian and Vietnamese resistances and on more contemporary concepts: it is a fusion of guerrilla techniques and modern warfare," explains Kassem Kassir.
Under his impetus, troops professionalized: units specialized, intelligence capabilities improved, and the pace of operations increased. This new strategy earned Nasrallah respect and admiration. He was systematically reappointed as the party's head, and the bylaws were amended to allow his re-election for more than two consecutive terms.
The winning formula of the decade - a policy of outreach coupled with a meticulous management of military affairs - allowed him, in parallel, to shape a persona to measure. His oratory skills got him noticed within the partisan circles, while his name became increasingly inseparable from that of the party. The myth emerges in "peace" time – but always in light of war.
Several key milestones contribute to establishing the new "Nasrallah" brand among the Lebanese public. While the 1990s are punctuated by a series of armed clashes in the South, the April 1996 escalation, during which the Israeli army killed a hundred civilians, positioned the secretary-general of Hezbollah as the champion of national defense.
In sixteen days of conflict, his troops fire 639 rockets towards Israel. "Gone are the days when they killed our people without us taking revenge," he declares on the partisan channel al-Manar. Some time later, on September 13, 1997, the combat death of his son Hadi highlights a new aspect of the character, human, with which the public can easily identify. The event also accredits the image of a solid war leader ready for personal sacrifice for the greater cause. "We, Hezbollah leadership, do not jealously guard our children," he says in a speech the day after his eldest son's death.
Finally, the liberation of the South on May 25, 2000, provides what these years of armed guerrilla had not furnished: proof that his military strategy works. After eighteen years of occupation, the enemy packs up. Overnight, weeks before the announced date, abandoning in the process its allies of the South Lebanon Army. Hezbollah seems to have achieved what very few Arab armies had managed to do.
The party's media stage the sequence, broadcasting images of the celebratory scenes. "Allah, Allah protect Nasrallah!" is heard in the streets of the liberated South. Glorified by this success, the name of Hassan Nasrallah resonates throughout the region. At the head of a militia party now anchored in the Lebanese landscape, having proven itself on the military ground, the Hezbollah boss enters the new decade with a considerable sympathy capital.
The Ultimate Consecration
The ultimate consecration comes with the July 2006 war. In thirty-three days of operations, 7,000 bombs are fired towards Lebanese territory, against about 4,000 rockets launched by Hezbollah towards Israel. With 1,125 Lebanese dead, over 4,000 injured, and a million displaced, the toll is heavy.
But the human and material cost does not change the way the sequence is interpreted by the population. Although Hezbollah initiated the spark that triggered the conflict (rocket fire towards Israel on July 12, while a commando group attacked enemy soldiers), Hassan Nasrallah establishes himself as the last bulwark against the Israeli war machine.
He becomes a war hero. The victory is "even greater than that of 2000," he will say. The "new model," he explains, is based on an offensive approach to "resistance": it is no longer confined to a defensive stance. The sequence highlights the evolution of methods and the emergence of new processes to mobilize the troops and intimidate the enemy.
His eloquence, art of speeches, and mastery of images allow him to convey messages and influence the general mood. The war becomes psychological. Though he is the public face of the war, Hassan Nasrallah is not the operation's mastermind, piloted by the two great military cadres of the time - Imad Mughniyeh, former senior military official of the party, and Qassem Soleimani, former Iranian head of the external operations of the Revolutionary Guards.
The strategy "was collectively thought out," and "his contacts with the operations room were permanent when he did not sit there in person," recalls Aurélie Daher. But the Sayyed is not the only master on board. As triumphant as it is, 2006 also marks the end of an era. Because he is aware of its extremely high cost, Hassan Nasrallah declares at the end of the conflict that the party would have "absolutely not conducted this operation if it had known it would lead to such a large-scale war."
The leader seems to understand that the country would not bear a second sacrifice of this magnitude. From 2006 onwards, the southern front stabilizes. Hezbollah now refrains from reacting to the daily mini-aggressions from the enemy army. The Sayyed's speeches retain all their bellicose charge, but the engagement rules at the Israeli-Lebanese border are entirely renewed: "resistance" becomes performative. The Shiite movement re-invests the domestic political scene – especially since the Syrian troops’ departure on April 26, 2005, following the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, for which three party members will be found guilty by the Special Tribunal for Lebanon, reshuffles the deck.
Instead of disappearing, the war moves to new terrains. Internally first, where the quest for political space domination pushes Hassan Nasrallah to use his military arsenal as a tool of intimidation. This strategy culminates on May 7, 2008, when the movement invades the western neighborhoods of the capital and tries to impose itself by force in Mount Lebanon to compel Fouad Siniora's government to backtrack on its plan to dismantle its telecom networks and dismiss the airport security chief in Beirut, reputed to be close to the party.
The sequence confirms the new logic, now dedicated to internal political gains, and the war blackmail the militia is capable of. The red lines have been drawn. They will no longer be questioned. From 2011 to today, the regional upheavals induced by the Arab Spring uprisings shift the priorities for Tehran and the Hezbollah leader. Officially in the name of the fight against "takfirists," forces concentrate on the Syrian ground from 2013.
In Iraq and Yemen, contingents form, advise, and supervise local allies of the "axis of resistance." The world's most powerful non-state armed organization becomes the main strike force of the Iranian apparatus in the region. "From a Lebanese resistance group, Hezbollah has become an essential component of the Revolutionary Guards," explains Hanin Ghaddar, a researcher at the Washington Institute.
"With a presence in Europe, Latin America, and Africa, they have both a regional military foothold and an international financial anchorage." The Secretary-General, now the party's cement, supports, accompanies, and embodies this transformation. The serial assassinations of senior Lebanese and Iranian dignitaries – Imad Mughniyeh (2008), Mustafa Badreddine (2016), and then Qassem Soleimani (2020) – leave a vacant space of advisor and military strategist in Tehran, gradually filled by Hassan Nasrallah.
But the Sayyed also sees his image cracking. The bodies of "martyrs" returning from the Syrian front by the hundreds, or more, embarrass the movement. An increasing part of the Lebanese public no longer understand the sense of its military interventions throughout the region. The ideological DNA of Hezbollah, once anchored to the sacrosanct Palestinian resistance, has diluted.
"The road to Jerusalem does not pass through the 'ring'," can be read on Beirut's walls during the October 2019 uprising, as the party dispatches its troops downtown to create a climate of terror on the ground. Hassan Nasrallah, seeking new enemies, is increasingly perceived internally as a sectarian, venal, and corrupt leader, just like the others.
The glorious memories of 1996, 2000, or 2006 fade gradually as they are replaced by darker ones – the double explosion at the Beirut port, with implicated officials, or the assassination of Shiite opponent Lokman Slim, attributed to the party.
What remains are the brute force of arms, always capable of plunging the country into the war it seems unwilling to have.
Sources:
DAHER, Aurélie, "Hezbollah, mobilization and power" (PUF, 2014).
NOE, Nicholas, "Voices of Hezbollah, the Statements of Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah" (Verso, 2007).
TRABOULSI, Fawwaz, A History of Modern Lebanon (Pluto Press, 2012).
