Three days of mourning in Lebanon for slain Hezbollah chief Nasrallah

Interim PM Najib Mikati’s office says the official mourning would start on Monday, with flags to fly at half-mast on public buildings.

Lebanon has announced three days of mourning for Hassan Nasrallah after an Israeli air strike in Beirut’s southern suburbs killed the longtime Hezbollah leader.

In a statement on Saturday, interim Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati’s office said the official mourning would start on Monday, with flags to fly at half-mast on public buildings.

Public offices will also close on the day of Nasrallah’s funeral, the statement added. Hezbollah has yet to announce the date for the funeral.

Mikati also said his country was under threat following Nasrallah’s killing as he denounced Friday’s air attacks that also killed Lebanese civilians in the Dahiyeh neighbourhood of Beirut.

In a televised statement, Mikati called for the Lebanese people to “stand united in the face of aggression” as the country remains on the brink of a humanitarian and economic crisis.

He was speaking at an emergency cabinet meeting that he convened upon returning from the United Nations General Assembly in New York.

Mikati did not mention Nasrallah in his address, but his office later published the decision to hold three days of national mourning.

Nasrallah, who led Hezbollah for more than three decades, is by far the most powerful target to be killed by Israel in weeks of intensified fighting with Hezbollah.

According to the UN, more than 50,000 people have fled Lebanon for Syria, as Israel’s attacks on Lebanon have killed at least 700 people since Monday.

‘Beirut struck again’

The Israeli forces continued to bomb Beirut on Saturday, promising to keep targeting Hezbollah commanders. Several residential areas were targeted, mainly in the densely populated southern suburbs.

Israeli military officials said they killed two more Hezbollah commanders in what they called “precision” strikes.

The Reuters news agency, citing a Lebanese security source, said an Israeli strike hit an industrial area 500 metres (1,640 feet) from Beirut airport, Lebanon’s only international passenger facility. The source said the area hit was full of car repair garages.

But the head of Lebanon’s national carrier Middle East Airlines, Mohammad al-Hout, said the airport was operating normally. “The Beirut airport is not being targeted, there are no weapons there,” al-Hout told Reuters.

Hezbollah and Israel have been exchanging fire in a conflict parallel with Israel’s devastating war on Gaza that started in October last year. At least 41,586 Palestinians have been killed and 96,210 wounded in Israel’s attacks on the besieged enclave.

Israeli authorities say at least 1,139 people were killed and more than 200 people were taken captive following a Hamas-led attack on Israel on October 7 last year.

Israel says it has been attacking Hezbollah with the aim of allowing tens of thousands of residents evacuated from northern Israel to return home.

In Lebanon, more than 200,000 people have been displaced, about half of them since Monday, after Israel intensified its attacks on the country.