Fadlallah, Sheik Mohamed Hussein (1936–)

A Shiite Muslim scholar, Sheik Mohamed Hussein Fadlallah is said to be the religious adviser of Hezbollah, the Lebanese militant group and political party also known as Party of God. In his impassioned speeches, Fadlallah has called for Lebanon to be organized as a theocratic Islamic state.

Fadlallah was born in 1936 in Najaf, the Iraqi city holy to Shiite Muslims where his father, a religious leader from southern Lebanon, was studying. Fadlallah grew up in Iraq, and reportedly speaks with a slight Iraqi accent.

While a student in Najaf, Fadlallah helped one of his professors, Mohammed Bakr al-Sadr, to found the underground Dawa Party, which was later banned by Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.

Fadlallah moved to Beirut in 1966, after he had finished his studies. He soon married Noureddin Noureddin, daughter of a prominent Lebanese Islamic scholar. They are said to have 11 children. As an imam at a mosque, Fadlallah worked to organize Islamic students, forming the Islamic Students' Union in Lebanon and writing some 40 books on Islamic law.

Fadlallah served as an important spiritual adviser to members of Hezbollah from its beginnings in the early 1980s. After the 1983 bombings of the U.S. Marine barracks and French paramilitary compounds in Beirut, both linked to Hezbollah, Christian rivals claimed that Fadlallah had blessed the two suicide drivers. Fadlallah has repeatedly denied this accusation, and followers have explained that “giving a blessing” is a largely Christian practice.

During the late 1980s and early 1990s hostage crisis in Lebanon, Fadlallah was said to command respect among the militants; relatives of hostages visited him to plead for release of the captives.

In 1985, an explosive was planted on the path between Fadlallah's mosque and his home. The blast spared Fadlallah, who had stopped to listen to an old woman on his way home, but killed 80 people. Press reports claimed that a group linked to the CIA was responsible for the bombing.

Fadlallah's influence has grown in Lebanon, and he is often called the country's most respected Shiite Muslim cleric. He has often spoken against a peace agreement with Israel and the idea of “land for peace.” In 1995, when the United States declared a freeze on the assets of extremist groups that did not support the peace process, including Hezbollah, Fadlallah urged Muslims to boycott U.S. goods.

As violence increased in the Middle East in 2002, Fadlallah told the Arab press that suicide bombing attacks are required in what he calls a “holy war” against Israel.