A Lebanese woman holds a portrait of slain Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, as she waits with others for permission from the Lebanese army to enter their village after the Israeli troops withdrew from it, in Bint Jbeil town, south Lebanon, on January 26, 2025.
| Photo Credit: AP

The head of Lebanon’s armed group Hezbollah said on Sunday (February 2, 2025) that his predecessor, Hassan Nasrallah, would be laid to rest on February 23, nearly five months after he was killed in an Israeli air attack on Beirut’s southern suburbs.

Nasrallah, who had served as Hezbollah’s secretary general for more than 30 years, was killed on September 27 as Israel ramped up its air attacks on Hezbollah targets and just days before Israeli troops began ground incursions into southern Lebanon.

His successor Naim Qassem said in a televised address on Sunday that Nasrallah was killed “at a time when circumstances were difficult,” forcing the group to conduct a temporary burial for him according to religious tradition.

Mr. Qassem said the group had now decided to hold “a grand funeral procession with a large public presence” for both Nasrallah and Hashem Safieddine, another top Hezbollah official killed in an Israeli strike nearly a week after Nasrallah.

Mr. Qassem confirmed on Sunday for the first time that Safieddine had been elected as Nasrallah’s successor but was killed before the announcement was made. He said Safieddine would also be buried with the title of secretary general.

The killings of both Nasrallah and Safieddine — as well as many of the group’s top military commanders — threw Hezbollah into disarray. The group announced on October 29 that Mr. Qassem, the group’s deputy leader, had been elected as its head.

A ceasefire agreed in late November ended hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel and set a 60-day deadline for Israeli troops to withdraw from southern Lebanon, Hezbollah to remove its fighters and arms from the area and Lebanese troops to deploy there.

That deadline was extended last month until February 18. Israel has continued to carry out some airstrikes on parts of Lebanon, accusing Hezbollah of violating the terms of the ceasefire.

Hezbollah says Israel is responsible for the breaches and says the Lebanese state and the deal’s foreign sponsors — the U.S. and France — should prevent Israel’s violations. But it has not threatened to resume fighting.

A Lebanese woman mourns, as she holds a frame with the portraits of two victims who were among four civilians from the same family that killed on Sunday by Israeli strikes in Beirut.
| Photo Credit: AP

Lebanese official media said an Israeli strike on May 6 wounded three people in the country’s east, with Hezbollah saying it launched “dozens of Katyusha rockets” at an Israeli base in retaliation.

Israel and Lebanon’s Hezbollah have exchanged regular cross-border fire since Palestinian militant group Hamas’s unprecedented October 7 attack on southern Israel sparked war in the Gaza Strip.

In recent weeks Hamas-ally Hezbollah has stepped up its attacks on northern Israel, and the Israeli military has struck deeper into Lebanese territory.

“Enemy warplanes launched a strike at around 1:30 a.m. this morning on a factory in Sifri, wounding three civilians and destroying the building,” Lebanon’s official National News Agency said.

Sifri is in Lebanon’s eastern Bekaa Valley in the Baalbek area, a Hezbollah stronghold that Israel has repeatedly struck in recent weeks, located around 80 kilometres (50 miles) from the Israel-Lebanon frontier.

The Israeli army said its warplanes “struck a Hezbollah military structure… deep inside Lebanon,” referring to the location as “Safri”.

Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah group said it launched “dozens of Katyusha rockets” targeting “the headquarters of the Golan Division… at Nafah base” in the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights.

The strikes by Hezbollah on Israel came “in response to the enemy’s attack targeting the Bekaa region”, it said.

Hezbollah later claimed a drone attack on troops in northern Israel, with the Israeli army saying “a UAV (drone) was identified crossing from Lebanon into the area of Metula”.

The army also said “fighter jets struck approximately 15 (Hezbollah) military structures and terror infrastructure” in south Lebanon.

Last month, a building in Sifri was targeted in an Israeli raid, while the Israeli army said it had targeted Hezbollah sites in Lebanon’s east.

The intensifying exchanges have stoked fears of all-out conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, which went to war in 2006.

In Lebanon, at least 390 people have been killed in nearly seven months of cross-border violence, mostly militants but also more than 70 civilians, according to an AFP tally.

On Sunday official media in Lebanon said an Israeli strike on a southern village killed four family members, with Hezbollah announcing retaliatory attacks.

Israel says 11 soldiers and nine civilians have been killed on its side of the border.

Tens of thousands of people have been displaced on both sides.