Hezbollah Battles to Shed Extremist Image in Lebanon

At the Jihad Construction office in Nabatiyeh, north of the occupied zone, civil engineer Malik Saad said he keeps a permanent team of technicians on staff and employs crews when needed to repair damage from Israeli raids. These days, Saad said, the crews in bright yellow vests are patching up about 15 houses a month and have built five shelters as protection against rocket fire.

"We do this to help the people and to make them feel we are not the problem, that Israel is the problem," Saad said.

Likewise, Al Janoub Hospital in Nabatiyeh is available "to heal the wounds of the resistance fighters . . . and to support the inhabitants of the areas close to the front lines," according to Deputy Director Ahmad Saad.

Both institutions help ensure that civilians remain in the towns within shooting distance of the occupied zone--and do not leave the guerrillas without cover. Hezbollah says it helps any family that needs it, regardless of religion or political affiliation. But most of the population in those parts is Muslim, and Hezbollah's influence is visible in banners with its logo of a raised Kalashnikov assault rifle and murals of Ayatollah Khomeini.

According to Nabatiyeh resident Um Mahdi Dabsheh, the widow of a Hezbollah combatant who died last year, "Everybody is Hezbollah here because everyone suffers from the Israeli occupation, and everyone looks to Hezbollah to get rid of the Israelis."

BACKGROUND

Hezbollah was founded in 1982 by Shiite Muslim leaders who broke away from the rival Amal militia and trained in Lebanon with Iranian Revolutionary Guards. During the 1980s, the group operated under a number of names to carry out attacks, including the suicide bombing of a U.S. Marine compound, the abduction of Associated Press reporter Terry Anderson and the kidnapping of nearly 100 other foreigners in Lebanon, according to Magnus Ranstorp, a Hezbollah expert at St. Andrews University in Scotland. Israel invaded Beirut in 1982, then pulled its forces back to Tyre. From 1983 to 1985, Hezbollah launched suicide bombings and other attacks that eventually forced Israel south into the current 9-mile-wide occupied zone. Sheik Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah, one of the highest religious authorities of the Shiite community in Lebanon, is the spiritual leader of Hezbollah but has no formal role in the organization. Sheik Hassan Nasrallah has been secretary-general of Hezbollah since February 1992 and is the one responsible for forging Hezbollah's more temperate image. His tenure is to expire in April. He is not supposed to fill another term, but Hezbollah leaders say they have no one of equal stature to replace him.