Mourners attend former Hezbollah leader Nasrallah’s funeral in Lebanon

Nearly five months after the former leader of Hezbollah was killed in an Israeli airstrike on a southern suburb of the Lebanese capital, tens of thousands of people gathered in Beirut to pay his funeral.

Hassan Nasrallah, the group’s leader for more than 30 years and one of its founders, was killed in September last year when Israel’s air force dropped more than 80 bombs on the group’s main operations room.

Mourners dressed in black, some waving Hezbollah flags or carrying portraits of Nasrallah, flocked to the mass funeral, delayed because of security concerns. In the chilly conditions, many Lebanonese citizens and children made the journey on foot to the ceremony site.

On the walls and bridges across south Beirut were gigantic portraits of Nasrallah and Hashem Safieddine, Nasrallah’s chosen successor who was killed in another Israeli air raid before he could assume the position. The two had been interred in a covert manner.

In addition to thousands of people and activists from all over the world, Hezbollah senior official Ali Daamoush announced to reporters that 800 people from 65 countries and representatives from around the world would attend the funeral service.

Safieddine will be interred in his southern Lebanoned hometown, Nasrallah, later on Sunday in Beirut, while Safieddine will be interred there.

Hezbollah set up giant screens outside the stadium and along the airport road for those who couldn’t fit inside. The funeral home’s main roads have been closed, and flights to and from Beirut airport have been halted for four hours as a result of tight security measures. The Lebanese army and police are on alert, and it is prohibited to fly drones during the day in Beirut and its suburbs.

Source: Aljazeera