Hezbollah 101: Who is the militant group, and what does it want?
The Shiite militant group and political party is a player not just in Lebanon, where it is based, but across the broader Middle East. It remains a staunch opponent of Israel, which it fought to a standstill in 2006, and a close ally of Iran and Syria – despite both regimes' crackdowns on citizens Hezbollah purports to champion.
 |
| Iranian-backed Hezbollah guerrillas, wrapping themselves with explosives, parade in a show of force in the southern Lebanese market town of Nabatiyeh on May 27, 1996 on the holiday of Ashura. In The background is Hezbollah's flag. (Mohamed Zatari/AP/File) |
What are the origins of Hezbollah?
Hezbollah was founded by a small group of Lebanese Shiite clerics as a response to Israel's 1982 invasion of southern Lebanon. They were inspired by the teachings of two radical religious scholars: Mohammed Baqr as-Sadr of Iraq and Ruhollah Khomeini, who led the 1979 Islamic revolution in Iran.
With the assistance of Iran's Revolutionary Guards, Hezbollah's early leadership mobilized Lebanon's Shiite population to resist the Israeli occupation. Beginning in the Bekaa Valley in eastern Lebanon, hundreds of new recruits were given military training and religious indoctrination. During the 1980s, Hezbollah's influence spread from the Bekaa to Beirut, where it was blamed for the 1983 suicide bombings of the US Embassy and the US Marine barracks, in which more than 300 people perished, as well as the kidnappings of foreigners. Hezbollah denies any role.
Lebanon's civil war ended in 1990, and all the militias were obliged to disarm. Only Hezbollah was permitted to keep its weapons so that it could continue resisting Israel's occupation in south Lebanon.
Hezbollah says could hit all of Israel in future war
(Reuters) - Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah warned Israel on Sunday that thousands of rockets
would rain down on Tel Aviv and cities across the Jewish state if it attacked
Lebanon.
Speaking four days after the ceasefire which ended a week of conflict between
Israel and the Islamist Hamas rulers of
Gaza, Nasrallah said Hezbollah's response to any attack would dwarf the rocket
fire launched from Palestinian territories.
"Israel, which was shaken by a handful of Fajr-5 rockets during eight days -
how would it cope with thousands of rockets which would fall on Tel Aviv and
other (cities) ... if it attacked Lebanon?" Nasrallah said.
The Fajr-5s, with a range of 75 km (45 miles) - able to strike Tel Aviv or
Jerusalem - and 175 kg (386 lb) warheads, are the most powerful and long-range
rockets to have been fired from Gaza.
But Hezbollah, which fought Israel to a standstill in a 34-day war six years
ago, says it has been re-arming since then and has a far deadlier arsenal than
Hamas. Nasrallah has said Hezbollah could kill tens of thousands of people and
strike anywhere inside Israel if hostilities break out again.
"If the confrontation with the Gaza Strip ... had a range of 40 to 70 km, the
battle with us will range over the whole of occupied Palestine - from the
Lebanese border to the Jordanian border, to the Red Sea," Nasrallah
said.
Hezbollah could hit targets "from Kiryat Shmona - and let the Israelis listen
carefully - from Kiryat Shmona to Eilat", he said, referring to Israeli's
northernmost town on the Lebanese border to the Red Sea port 290 miles further
south.
The movement has warned that any Israeli attack against the nuclear
facilities of its patron Iran, which has
armed and funded the Lebanese Shi'ite Muslim militant group, would inflame the
Middle East - though it has not specified its own response.
In a move it said showed it could penetrate deep inside Israeli defenses, it
flew a drone over Israel last month. The drone was shot down after flying 25
miles into southern Israel.
Israel says its Iron Dome missile defense system knocked out 90 percent of
the rockets fired from Gaza which were on course to hit populated
areas.
TENS OF THOUSANDS MARK ASHURA
Nasrallah, who has lived in hiding since 2006 to avoid assassination by
Israel, was speaking by video-link to tens of thousands of Shi'ite faithful in
southern Beirut commemorating Ashura, the day when the Prophet Mohammad's
grandson Hussein was killed in battle 13 centuries ago.
Wearing a black turban and robes in a sign of mourning, the 52-year-old
cleric said his Shi'ite movement wanted to prevent sectarian tension in Lebanon
- fuelled by the civil war in Syria - plunging
his country into renewed conflict.
"We want to avert strife and Israel is our only enemy. We have no enemies in
Lebanon," Nasrallah said.
Many Sunni Muslim political leaders blamed Hezbollah's ally Syria for last month's bomb attack which
killed a top intelligence official and plunged Lebanon into political
crisis.
The opposition March 14 coalition blamed Syria for the assassination and
called on the Lebanese government, dominated by allies of Hezbollah and Syria,
to quit.
Sporadic clashes have erupted since then, including a shootout in the
southern city of Sidon two weeks ago when three people were killed after
supporters of a Sunni cleric tried to tear down Shi'ite Ashura banners.
On Saturday the army said it arrested five people and seized 450 grams (1lb)
of explosives in Nabatiyeh on the eve of an Ashura march in the southern
Lebanese town which was attended by thousands of Shi'ite mourners, many striking
their heads with blades to draw blood to mark the tragedy of Hussein's
death.
Security sources said the arrested men were Syrians suspected of planning an
attack on the Ashura processions but Nasrallah, speaking late on Saturday,
suggested they were trying to send arms to the conflict in Syria.
"We already know that many Syrians arrive in Lebanon to buy weapons," he
said. "Neither weather nor rain can frighten us, nor can explosions or security
threats stand between us and Imam Hussein".
No comments:
Post a Comment