ARAB SALIM/GHAZIEH, Lebanon: Safaa couldn’t find the strength to stand when the coffin of her husband, Hezbollah field commander Mohammad Issa, arrived in to their hometown of Arab Salim in Nabatieh. “Today is the last day you are going to sleep in your home, and tomorrow the soil will carry you, and I will never forget you, hero, the son of the resistance,” she said, speaking to the body of her deceased husband.
He was among six Hezbollah fighters who were killed in an Israeli helicopter strike Sunday on Syria’s Golan Heights, which also claimed the life of slain commander Imad Mughniyeh’s son Jihad, sparking fears of more bloodletting ahead.
Banners and pictures praising the bravery of Issa, also known as Abu Issa as his fellow fighters referred to him, were festooned on the streets. A portrait of the slain leader also hung outside the town’s Imam Khomeini Complex.
Abu Issa hailed from a family of martyrs, residents of Arab Salim told The Daily Star. When the Syrian uprising began, he considered fighting for Hezbollah alongside the Syrian regime a duty. The son of a Lebanese mother and Syrian father, Abu Issa was described by those who knew him as determined and brave.
“Since he was a kid and he loved to hike the mountains and valleys and he loved rigorous work,” his uncle Yehya Moukalled said. “When he was 12 he was already a man.”
“The hills of our town were occupied by the Israeli enemy and bombs used to fall on us all the time, only Mohammad would go outside to provide the people with their needs,” he said.
“He was martyred and that was his wish, to fall as a martyr facing the Zionist enemy,” Moukalled said.
Tens of men who were trained by Abu Issa stood by to pay their respects, describing him as a man who thrived in the field.
At the age of 14 Abu Issa joined the resistance.
His first important task entailed inspecting Israeli army posts as well as those belonging to the South Lebanon Army, aligned with the Jewish state in 1986 which was occupying south Lebanon. On his days off he would dedicate himself to social work.
Abu Issa quickly climbed up the ranks of the resistance and assumed a leadership role in many key battles with Israel, including the July 2006 War. He was married and leaves behind four children.
Hezbollah also mourned the deaths of Mohammed Ali Hasan Abu al-Hasan, 29, from Ain Qana, Ghazi Ali Dawi, 26, who hails from Khiam and is married with one child, and Ali Hasan Ibrahim, 21, from Yohmour Shqif, who joined the resistance when he was 15.
In the Sidon district of Ghazieh, residents prepared to bury their son Abbas Ibrahim Hijazi, 35, alongside his father, who passed away due to illness a few hours after the family was informed of the fighter’s death. The elderly Hijazi, known as Abu Kamal, had been in a coma for a month, and served Hezbollah as a founding member and dedicated 30 years of his life to the resistance.
Abbas Hijazi played an important role during the 2006 War, and during battles between Hezbollah, the Syrian regime and Syrian rebel factions in Qusair and Yabroud last year.
Hijazi was the youngest of six siblings and gained prominence as a resistance fighter.
He is married to the daughter of Abu Hasan Salameh, a Hezbollah commander who was killed by the Israelis in 1999.
Hijazi leaves behind a wife and four children, including a newborn girl, whom he had had a chance to see before departing for Syria. Rather than mourn him, the Hijazi family congratulated his martyrdom, a fate he had long sought, relatives said.
“He was promised [martyrdom] and he used to say ‘I want to be the first of my brothers to be martyred,’” Hijazi’s mother said. “He came to me, said goodbye and left. The second day, he was martyred.”
The family accepted condolences for both deaths at the Imam Mahdi Complex and the family home.
“I am proud of him,” Hijazi’s wife Zeinab said.
“This is the house of a mujahedeen and it’s not unusual for martyrs to be produced in it,” said the wife of Abu Hasan Salameh, Hijazi’s mother-in-law. “We are proud of your martyrdom, Abbas.”
A cousin said Hijazi’s martyrdom was one many Hezbollah supporters would willingly replicate. “We tell Sayyed Hasan [Nasrallah] the great leader that everything that has happened will only increase our determination and pride.”
“We tell you that we’re all with you, with the blood of our children and our souls, and all that we have.”
No comments:
Post a Comment