Hezbollah must decide: disarm, fight on or turn fully to politics

Devastated by war with Israel and with its key allies in disarray, the Lebanese militant group is isolated and facing the most significant choice of its 40-year history, writes

- Oliver Marsden in Beirut

Marching through the streets of Dahiyeh in southern Beirut, men beat their chests and chanted slogans. They carried Hezbollah flags, the infamous green AK-47 emblem hovering over Arabic script reading “Party of God”, passing one pancaked building after another. Children darted between the crowds, some wearing yellow Hezbollah headbands, clutching lemonade bottles adorned with the face of the late Hezbollah secretary general, Hassan Nasrallah.

They were marching to commemorate Ashura, a day of mourning for Shia Muslims held annually to commemorate the death of Husayn ibn Ali, grandson of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, killed in AD680 at the battle of Karbala.

But it also served as a show of support for Hezbollah, which needs all the backing it can get after its devastating war with Israel last year left it decimated - its leaders assassinated, thousands of its soldiers killed and its influence inside Lebanon damaged.

Further setbacks followed. In neighbouring Syria, the regime of Bashar al-Assad collapsed in December after nearly 14 years of civil war. Hezbollah forces - long stationed in Syria to prop up Assad - withdrew overnight, abandoning both the Assad family and its key supply route from Iran to Lebanon.

Next, Israel launched a blistering 12-day war on Iran that left Hezbollah’s key patron unable to send funds to Lebanon as it surveyed the destruction at home.