Yitzhak Horowitz, a journalist with the ultra-Orthodox magazine B’Kehilla, recently visited Beirut’s Dahieh district, a stronghold of Hezbollah, including the burial site of the group’s longtime leader Hassan Nasrallah, according to an article set to be published Thursday in the Hebrew-language weekly.
Horowitz wrote that he toured Dahieh, where numerous Hezbollah flags are displayed, and visited both the area of the underground bunker where Nasrallah was killed and the site where he is buried. He said his local guide told him Hezbollah purchased the burial plot from an insurance company, demolished the building that stood there and plans to construct a large mosque at the site.
According to Horowitz, he hesitated before entering the tent housing Nasrallah’s grave, but was reassured by the guide. “Do not be afraid. You must do exactly as I tell you. You go in, and if they ask you questions, you do not understand Arabic. I will answer for you,” the guide told him. Horowitz said the guide instructed him to say he was from Spain.
Horowitz quoted the guide as saying, “The holy Nasrallah will yet rise again, and we pray that he will return to lead the resistance against the forces of evil.” Horowitz said he did not dare bring a phone into the compound, but the guide agreed to photograph him near the grave.
As they left the site, Horowitz said he saw a blind man whom the guide said had been injured in a pager explosion. “Now they are bringing him to pray at Sayyid Nasrallah,” the guide said.
Nasrallah was buried in Beirut in February, nearly five months after he was killed. Hundreds of thousands of supporters of the Lebanese terror group gathered at a large stadium in the capital and at other locations across Beirut for the funeral ceremony.
The compound housing the grave of Nasrallah in Lebanon
At the same time, in what Israel said was an effort to counter what it described as a show of force, four Israeli Air Force fighter jets — two F-15s and two F-35s — were seen flying over Beirut. Lebanese media reported the jets flew at low altitude over the area where the ceremony was held, and sonic booms were heard in videos circulated online.
The IDF confirmed its aircraft flew over the Lebanese capital and released rare footage of the flyover. The jets also passed over the stadium during a televised address by Hezbollah’s new secretary-general, Naim Qassem, who did not attend the ceremony in person. Lebanese reports said the aircraft again flew “very low” over the city and were documented directly above the stadium as crowds chanted, “At your command, Nasrallah! Death to America! Death to Israel!”