A video clip showing Hezbollah leader Hashem Safieddine kissing a rifle with a group of soldiers has recently spread on social media, “Hezbollah’s new leader, Hashem Safieddine, just appeared in a promotional video kissing an AK-47 rifle”.
Kashif verified the video via “Google Images” tool and found that it is old and the claim is misleading. The clip shows a Hezbollah maneuver in 2023.
On30/5/2023, Al-Manar TV channel published a video clip in a report with the following title: “Video | War Media publishes new scenes of the Islamic Resistance maneuver a few days ago.” It turned out that the circulated video clip is an excerpt from the maneuver video which falls specifically between 14:27 and 15:15.
Al-Alam channel also published the video on 31/5/2023 in a report stating that Hezbollah had conducted a maneuver in southern Lebanon a few days ago, which included a military parade and a simulation of attacks targeting the Israeli occupation via a drone or a raid. About 200 Hezbollah members participated in the maneuver, which was conducted in the town of Armata, about 20 km north of the border with Israel, on the occasion of the anniversary of Israel’s withdrawal from southern Lebanon on 25/5/2000.
Hezbollah announced on Saturday 28/9/2024 the killing of the party’s Secretary-General, Hassan Nasrallah, in an Israeli bombardment on Friday 27/9/2024 on the southern suburbs of Beirut.
Hezbollah has not yet announced the selection of its Secretary-General to succeed Nasrallah, as of the time of preparing this verification. Meanwhile, Hashem Safieddine, Nasrallah’s cousin and son-in-law of the former commander of the Quds Force in the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, Qassem Soleimani, is at the forefront of the names nominated to lead the party, according to press reports.
Al-Hadath and Al-Arabiya channels announced, according to private sources, that Hezbollah’s Shura Council had chosen Hashem Safieddine as Nasrallah’s successor, while Hezbollah’s media relations confirmed in a brief statement issued on 30/9/2024, that the circulating news related to the organizational procedures within the party’s leadership after Nasrallah’s assassination is of no importance and cannot be built upon unless an official statement is issued regarding it.