Hassan Nasrallah
Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah () (b.
August 31 1960,
Burj Hammud,
Beirut,
Lebanon)
, is the current Secretary General of the
Lebanese Islamist party
Hezbollah.
Nasrallah lived in South Beirut with his wife Fatima Yassin (who comes from the Lebanese village of Al Abbasiyah)
and five children: Muhammad Hadi (d. 1997), Muhammad Jawad, Zeinab, Muhammad Ali and Muhammad Mahdi. In September
1997, his eldest son Muhammad Hadi was killed by Israeli forces in Jabal al-Rafei in southern Lebanon.
In
1975, the
civil war in Lebanon forced the 15 year old Nasrallah and his family to move to their ancestral home in the South Lebanese village of
Al Bazuriyah.
Here he joined the
Amal Movement, a political group representing
Shiites in Lebanon.
After a period of Islamic study in Iraq he returned to Lebanon, where he studied at the school of Amal's leader Sheikh
Abbas al-Musawi, later being selected as Amal's political delegate in Beqaa, and making him a member of the central political office. After the
Israeli invasion in 1982, Nasrallah joined Hezbollah to dedicate himself to the resistance of the Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon and the
Bekaa Valley.
Nasrallah is a devoted Muslim and has spent periods of his life studying at religious centres in Iraq. In the mid-1970s he moved to a Shiite Hawza (Islamic Seminary) in the Iraqi city of
Najaf to study Qura'anic divine sciences , completing the first stage of his studies in
1978 before being forced to leave by the Iraqi authorities . Despite his ongoing commitment to Hezbollah, in 1989 Nasrallah resumed his efforts to become a religious jurisprudent by moving to the sacred Iranian city of
Qom to further his studies. Nasrallah believes that Islam holds the solution to the problems of any society, once saying, "With respect to us, briefly, Islam is not a simple religion including only praises and prayers, rather it is a divine message that was designed for humanity, and it can answer any question man might ask concerning his general and private life. Islam is a religion designed for a society that can revolt and build a state."
Nasrallah said once in an interview that he reads many books, particularly the memoirs of political figures, including
Ariel Sharon's autobiography, "Memoirs of Sharon" and
Benjamin Netanyahu's A Place Under the Sun, with the intention of getting to know his enemies.
Nasrallah became the leader of
Hezbollah after Israel assassinated the movement's leader
Abbas al-Musawi in
1992.
Under Nasrallah's leadership, Hezbollah became a serious opponent of the
Israel Defense Forces in Southern
Lebanon, managing to improve the organization's military capabilities and increasing the killing rate to approximately two dozen Israeli soldiers per year. Hezbollah's military campaigns of the late 1990s were believed to be one of the main factors that led to the Israeli decision to withdraw from Southern Lebanon in
2000, thus ending 18 years of occupation.
Consequently, Nasrallah is widely credited in Lebanon and the Arab world for ending the Israeli occupation in Southern Lebanon, something which has greatly bolstered the party's political standing within Lebanon.
[The Brooking Institution - Hezbollah's Popularity Exposes al-Qaeda's Failure to Win the Hearts]Nasrallah also played a major role in a complex prisoner exchange deal between Israel and Hezbollah in
2004, resulting in hundreds of Palestinian and Hezbollah prisoners being freed and bodies returned to Lebanon. The agreement was described across the Arab world as a great victory for Hezbollah with Nasrallah being personally praised for achieving these gains
.
In the aftermath of the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister
Rafiq al-Hariri the United Nations Security Council issued
Resolution 1559 which called for the withdrawal of foreign forces from Lebanon. This referred chiefly to Syria, which had held suzerainty over Lebanon since its 1976 intervention in the country's nascent
civil war. In response to
UNSCR 1559, Nasrallah initiated several large demonstrations expressing support for the Syrian government. UNSCR 1559 also called for the "the disbanding and disarmament of all Lebanese and non-Lebanese militias" and "the extension of the control of the Government of Lebanon over all Lebanese territory." This referred directly to Hezbollah whose military wing, as an armed force not controlled by the Lebanese government, constitutes a militia. Hezbollah also maintains de facto control over parts of south Lebanon, preventing the Lebanese government from exercising a monopoly of force within the country and asserting its control over Lebanon's southern border with Israel.
.
His home and office were destroyed by
Israeli bombing raids during the
2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict on July 14th 2006.
August 3,
2006: Hassan Nasrallah vowed to strike
Tel Aviv in retaliation for Israel's bombardment of Lebanon's capital,
Beirut. "If you hit Beirut, the Islamic resistance will hit Tel Aviv and is able to do that with God's help," Nasrallah said in a televised address. His forces were inflicting "maximum casualties" on Israeli ground troops."
Speaking at a graduation ceremony in Haret Hreik, Nasrallah announced on
October 22,
2002:
"if they [Jews] all gather in Israel, it will save us the trouble of going after them worldwide."
[Nasrallah alleges "Christian Zionist" plot by Badih Chayban, The Daily Star, October 23, 2002] The
New York Times qualifies this as
"genocidal thinking"
, whereas the
New York Sun likens it to the
1992 Hezbollah statement, which vowed,
"It is an open war until the elimination of Israel and until the death of the last Jew on earth."
qualifies his goal as genocide too, quoting Nasrallah ruling out
"co-existence with" the Jews or
"peace", as
"they are a cancer which is liable to spread again at any moment."
[Eradication First - Before Diplomacy by Michael Rubin, American Enterprise Institute, July 17, 2006] The Age quotes him like so:
"There is no solution to the conflict in this region except with the disappearance of Israel."
Despite declaring "death to Israel" in his public appearances, Nasrallah said in an interview to
The New Yorker, "at the end of the road no one can go to war on behalf of the Palestinians, even if that one is not in agreement with what the Palestinians agreed on."
When asked whether he was prepared to live with a two-state settlement between Israel and Palestine, he said he would not sabotage what is a Palestinian matter.
.
In another interview with the
Washington Post, Nasrallah said "I am against any reconciliation with Israel. I do not even recognize the presence of a state that is called "Israel." I consider its presence both unjust and unlawful. That is why if Lebanon concludes a peace agreement with Israel and brings that accord to the Parliament our deputies will reject it; Hezbollah refuses any conciliation with Israel in principle."
.
The scholar
Amal Saad-Ghorayeb quotes Nasrallah describing his view of Jews: "If we searched the entire world for a person more cowardly, despicable, weak and feeble in psyche, mind, ideology and religion, we would not find anyone like the Jew. Notice, I do not say the Israeli".
"Jews invented the legend of the Holocaust," said Nasrallah on April 9, 2000. During another appearance on Al-Manar on February 23, Nasrallah praised a leading European
Holocaust denier,
David Irving, for having "denied the existence of gas chambers."
*
"Hizballah: A Primer", Lara Deeb, 07/31/06
*
"Inside the Mind of Hezbollah", Washington Post, 7/16/2006.
*
"Hezbollah: The Major Leagues of Terrorism?", 7/20/2006.
*
Nasrallah: Israel temporary country YNET*
The Nasrallah Enigma--
Almasakin 04:13, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
Speeches and interviews
*
Interview with Al-Jazeera on July 20, 2006*
Speech on August 8, 2006*
Speech on August 3, 2006*
Speech on July 31, 2006*
Speech on July 14, 2006*
Speech on March 8, 2005
