The name Jawad Nasrallah resurfaced in international media in February 2021, after the assassination of Hezbollah critic Lokman Slim in Lebanon. Minutes after Slim’s assassination was conformed, Hezbollah’s leader Hassan Nasrallah’s son – Jawad Nasrallah – tweeted in Arabic “The loss of some is in fact an unexpected gain and kindness to others,” adding the hashtag #noremorse. Although he deleted his tweet later and justified it as a personal tweet that is not relevant to Slim’s killing, the message had already been delivered. Nasrallah wanted to let everyone know that Hezbollah was involved and that they do not care. The message was clear: we will kill anyone who works against us.
Nasrallah took to twitter – his favorite platform, which has banned him multiple times. But he keeps coming back. As an online celebrity, the son of Hezbollah’s aspires to lead via the internet. In fact, most of his activities – propaganda and terrorism – have been conducted online. Eventually, Jawad Nasrallah became a leader in what is known as Hezbollah’s military media, but his main responsibility stayed focused on online recruiting and propaganda.
THE TROUBLESOME SON
The 39 years old father of four is the second eldest son of Hassan Nasrallah, after his eldest brother Hadi was killed in 1997, allegedly during a military confrontation with Israeli armed forces in south Lebanon. In 2108, he was designated by the US State department, which described him as “the rising star of Hezbollah,” and he was sanctioned because he recruited people to carry out terrorist attacks against Israel and tried in 2016 to activate a suicide bombing and shooting cell based in the West Bank.
In the same State Department announcement, Al-Mujahidin Brigades (AMB) was also designated as Specially Designated Global Terrorists (SDGTs) under Section 1(b) of Executive Order 13224. AMB is a “military organization that has operated in the Palestinian Territories since 2005 and whose members have plotted a number of attacks against Israeli targets. AMB has ties to Hezbollah, and Hezbollah has provided funding and military training to AMB members,” the statement added.
Further research into Jawad Nasrallah’s role shows that he was allocated the task of internet recruitment, after much success in creating an internet and social media persona, mainly after years of posting on Facebook and Twitter about Hezbollah’s fighters who were killed in military operations. His social media know-hows have probably made him both credible and qualified to lead the online recruitment – or part of it – for Hezbollah. According to Israeli intelligence, Jawad Nasrallah worked with an agent under the nickname “Fadi,” who was an operative in Hezbollah’s Unit 133, responsible for operations in Israel and the West Bank.
In addition to his online recruiting job, Jawad Nasrallah enjoys his poetry. According to AP news, he had already published a collection of poems entitled Resistance Letters in which he glorifies those who have died fighting Israel.
AN OPERATOR; NOT A LEADER
It seems that Jawad Nasrallah’s dreams to inherit his father’s role – as the political scene in Lebanon expects – is long shot from being fulfilled. Unlike his father and other Hezbollah leaders, he is too brazen in his posts and commentaries, picks fights and threatens people directly. He does not possess the composure and the poise of a natural leader, and his sometimes childish behavior on social media gets him and Hezbollah under serious criticism. However, although his leadership attributes are weak, Jawad Nasrallah is a real operator, who understand logistics and social media messaging and communication strategies.
A deeper look into the details of his recruitment techniques can unveil his capabilities. When the Israeli security and intelligence apparatus revealed the details of Jawad’s involvement in the terrorist attack, it was clear that he was much more than an internet personality – or for that matter, a resistance celebrity. Nasrallah had spent a considerable amount of his time looking for potential terrorists, mainly in the West Bank, using his background and presence on social media. Apparently, his Facebook and Twitter accounts are just a façade for his real work: terrorism recruitment.
According to Shin Bet, the Israeli internal security service, Jawad was involved in recruiting the leader of the Tulkarem cell, Muhammad Zaghloul. He had apparently trained Zaghloul to recruit others for two goals: gathering intelligence and carrying out attacks. Zaghloul formed a cell of five-man cell, who asked Hezbollah – through Jawad Nasrallah – for $30,000, of which they have received $5000, and used the money to buy a sub-machine gun and a full magazine. The cell was eventually arrested by Shin Bet right before the operation was supposed to take place.
The first contact between Jawad Nasrallah and Zaghloul was through Facebook, when the latter asked him to help him establish contact with the party of god. It took a while – probably to vet Zaghloul and confirm his credibility, Jawad reached out to him via “Fadi,” who provided Zaghloul with codes to make sure his conversations with Nasrallah remain safe and encrypted.
FUTURE PROSPECTS
Unlike other political dynasties in Lebanon and the rest of the region, Hezbollah follows the Iranian code of succession. Succession in Hezbollah’s terms is not within the family, and we haven’t seen any political inheritance within Hezbollah’s circles. When Hezbollah’s former Secretary General Abbas Al-Moussawi was killed, he was not succeeded by a son or brother – as is the case with many political families in Lebanon and the region. He was succeeded by Hassan Nasrallah, who was chosen directly by his Iranian supervisors. Imad Mughnieh was also not succeeded by his son.
However, the sons of these figures are always more trusted by the Iranian regime, which take into consideration the value of family connections for many Lebanese. Family members of trusted figures also have better access to the leadership in Tehran and Qum, and receive better training and responsibilities. They also have access to more resources – financial and military – which they can use for financial benefits and political clout.
Accordingly, it is highly unlikely that Jawad Nasrallah will inherit his father’s position at the helm of Hezbollah. In addition to the succession mechanism that doesn’t work in his favor, he also does not convey a leadership personality. He sounds childish on social media – like a political influencer rather than a political leader. That being said, and despite his many intentional or unintentional controversies, he is someone who will stick around.
He is the son of Hassan Nasrallah, and that is in itself is an added-value attribute that both Hezbollah and the Iranian regime will try to exploit in three ways: to reach out to Hezbollah’s support base on social media, strengthen their propaganda machine through his online profile, and continue employing him for their online recruiting operations, probably under the supervision of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards.
Hanin Ghaddar is the Friedmann Fellow at The Washington Institute’s Geduld Program on Arab Politics, where she focuses on Shia politics throughout the Levant.
