Lebanon’s Top Shiite Cleric Fadlallah Dies in Beirut
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Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah, Lebanon’s top Shiite Muslim cleric who was once regarded as the spiritual leader of Hezbollah, died in Beirut after suffering “serious internal bleeding,” the state-run National News Agency reported.
Fadlallah, who was born in 1935, had advocated armed resistance by Hezbollah, the Lebanese Shiite party and militia, to Israel’s 18-year occupation of southern Lebanon, which ended with an Israeli withdrawal in 2000. He supported the creation of a Palestinian state in what is now Israel, the West Bank and Gaza.