Fadlallah, Sheikh Mohammad Hussein (1936–2010)

A Shiite Muslim scholar, Sheikh Mohammad Hussein Fadlallah was a religious advisor of Hezbollah, the Lebanese militant group and political party also known as Party of God. In his impassioned speeches, Fadlallah called for Lebanon to be organized as a theocratic Islamic state. He was revered in some quarters of the Middle East but highly controversial in the West because of his approval of terrorist attacks such as the 1983 bombing of a U.S. Marine compound in Beirut.

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, Muhammad Baqir 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 Najat Noureddin, the daughter of a prominent Lebanese Islamic scholar; they had 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 advisor 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. Nevertheless, during the late 1980s and early 1990s hostage crisis in Lebanon, Fadlallah was said to command respect among the militants, and relatives of the hostages visited him to plead for the 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 80 people were killed. Press reports claimed that a group linked to the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency was responsible for the bombing.

Fadlallah's influence continued to grow in Lebanon, and he was often called the country's most respected Shiite Muslim cleric. He spoke frequently 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 were required in what he called a “holy war” against Israel.

Fadlallah remained ardently opposed to Israel, which bombed his house in July 2006, and deeply suspicious of the United States and other foreign powers. However, he did become more moderate in his last years, distancing himself somewhat from Hezbollah and advocating for increased dialogue among Lebanon's oft-warring political factions. He died on July 4, 2010, at age 74.

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