Hezbollah Confirms the Death of Its Top Leader, Hassan Nasrallah

Thousands of Iranians protested in several cities and called for revenge for the death of their top leader, Hassan Nasrallah.  The protesters waved the flags of Iran, Palestine and Hezbollah, which together with the Palestinian group Hamas and Yemen’s Houthis, among others, make up the anti-Israel alliance “Axis of Resistance.”  Thousands of Iranians protested in several cities across Iran on Saturday to demand revenge for the death of the leader of the Lebanese Shiite group Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah, in the Israeli bombings on Friday against the suburbs of Beirut.  Hundreds of people marched in the Iranian capital’s Palestine Square, chanting “revenge,” “death to Israel” and “death to the United States,” which they blame for the death of Nasrallah and thousands of other Palestinians and Lebanese for supplying arms to Tel Aviv, the state-run IRNA news agency reported.

The protesters waved the flags of Iran, Palestine and Hezbollah, which together with the Palestinian group Hamas and the Yemeni Houthis, among others, make up the anti-Israel alliance “Axis of Resistance,” led by Tehran.  Similar demonstrations took place in the cities of Isfahan, Kerman, Qom and Mashad.  In Mashhad, a large black mourning flag has been raised atop the dome of the shrine of Imam Reza, the eighth imam of the Shiites.  Israel launched an unprecedented attack on a residential building in the suburbs of Beirut on Friday evening, killing the historic leader of Hezbollah and the deputy commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, Brigadier General Abbas Nilrushan, according to media reports in the country.  Iran is one of Lebanon’s main allies and one of Hezbollah’s closest allies, and has supported the group since its founding in the 1980s.  The Islamic Republic and Israel are bitter enemies, posing a mutual existential threat, competing for regional hegemony and waging a covert war involving cyberattacks, assassinations and sabotage.