Hezbollah Appoints Naim Qassem as New Leader

Hezbollah announced on Tuesday that Sheikh Naim Qassem, the deputy leader, has been chosen to succeed Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah as the group’s leader following Nasrallah’s death in an Israeli airstrike on southern Beirut last month.

In a statement, Hezbollah’s Shura Council confirmed, “Sheikh Naim Qassem has been elected as the secretary general of Hezbollah,” more than a month after Nasrallah’s assassination.

Initially, Sayyed Hashem Safieddine, who led Hezbollah’s executive council, was expected to replace Nasrallah. However, he too was killed shortly after in an Israeli strike on Beirut’s southern suburbs.

Qassem, 71, helped found Hezbollah in 1982 and has served as the organization’s deputy secretary general since 1991, one year before Nasrallah assumed leadership. Born in Beirut in 1953 to a family from Kfar Fila in southern Lebanon, Qassem has been one of Hezbollah’s most prominent public figures, continuing to make appearances even after Nasrallah went largely into hiding following the group’s 2006 conflict with Israel.

Since Nasrallah’s death in an Israeli strike on September 27, Qassem has delivered three televised speeches, adopting a more formal Arabic style in contrast to the colloquial Lebanese often used by Nasrallah.