Former Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah (left) with his son Jawad (right) during the funeral of the former's eldest son Hadi in 1997. (Credit: AFP)
Jawad Nasrallah, former Secretary-General of Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah, revealed Wednesday that in his last meeting with his wife, before heading to the military command room, Nasrallah told her, "We entrust this moment, this is the last time you will see me, we will not meet again."
Sharing previously unknown details about his father's final days in the Mishkat podcast hosted by Falah al-Quraishi, Jawad noted that his father gave hints about his impending death, telling him, "You will be a father to your sisters."
He also mentioned that his father's belongings still emit the scent of "toxic gas."
Nasrallah was assassinated when 80 tons of cluster bombs targeted a Hezbollah command center in the southern suburbs of Beirut on Sept. 27. Several senior Hezbollah commanders were also killed alongside him.
Jawad emphasized that Nasrallah was "in the [military] operating room on the frontlines, in a battlefield in the southern suburbs that was being bombarded, among his people."
When asked by the interviewer if it’s true that Nasrallah’s funeral was initially going to be in Karbala, Iraq Jawad said that “we were invited to have a tour of his body in [the holy sites] in Najaf, Karbala [both located in Iraq] and Mashhad [in Iran] but for Islamic jurisprudence reasons we can’t do this. When a body is buried according to the wadi'a [temporarily buried and will be removed to another location], it is only permissible to do so and immediately bury it.”
When Jawad was asked why the funeral was carried out almost five months after his father's assassination, he said that “the Sayyed has many haters” and they delayed the funeral until the “time became right.”
Nasrallah 'wanted to gain the honor of martyrdom'
“Many of Nasrallah’s supporters and opposers still don’t believe that Nasrallah has been killed. How do you reply to that?” the interviewer asked.
“For the lovers of my late father, I want to say that this is what he wanted. He wanted to gain the honor of martyrdom. It is only fit for a man like him to be killed in this way. I saw my father after he was killed and when he was being washed [before wrapping him in the coffin]; the Sayyed is dead,” Jawad said.
He reiterated that Nasrallah’s body was “unscratched and remained intact after the strike and, according to the doctors, he died because of the pressure” on his body, due to the strength of the strikes on the bunker in which he was targeted.
Jawad reiterated that during the funeral of one of Hezbollah’s commanders Fouad Shukur, who was assassinated in late July in Haret Hreik, southern suburbs of Beirut, his father had said while bidding farewell to Shukur, "I won't say goodbye, I will say, 'until we meet again.'"
At the beginning of February, Hezbollah Secretary General Naim Qassem announced that Hassan Nasrallah would be buried on Sunday, Feb. 23 “in a plot between the old and new roads leading to the airport,” in a “popular funeral.”
The funeral will also pay tribute to Hachem Safieddine, former chairman of the party's executive council and Hassan Nasrallah's intended successor, whose death was made official on Oct. 23, after being the target of a massive air strike on the night of Oct. 3 to 4. Safieddine will be buried in his native village of Deir Kanoun al-Nahr, in the Sour district of southern Lebanon.
