Hezbollah slain leader Nasrallah to be buried in Lebanon on February 23

The funeral of longtime Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah will be held on February 23, the group has said, months after he was killed in an Israeli air attack in Lebanon’s capital.

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 in Beirut’s southern suburbs.

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.

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.

He also confirmed 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.

Nasrallah will be buried on the outskirts of Beirut “in a plot of land we chose between the old and new airport roads”, while Safieddine will be buried in his hometown of Deir Qanoun in southern Lebanon, he said.

Hezbollah announced on October 29 that Qassem, the group’s deputy leader, had been elected as its head, after the killings of many of the group’s top military commanders threw the group into disarray.

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 been accused of violating the terms of the ceasefire by refusing to leave Lebanon and continuing to carry out occasional air attacks in some parts of the country. Israel itself accuses Hezbollah of violating the terms of the ceasefire.