Hezbollah draws on Ashura in battle and politics

BEIRUT, Jan 30 (Reuters) Khadija Hassan had prayed for her father to be killed in battle with Israel and was glad when he fell in Hezbollah's war with the Jewish state in Lebanon last year.

''I felt God had answered my prayer. I was very happy for him,'' the young girl told the presenter of children's show ''The Light of the Martyr'' on Hezbollah's Al-Manar TV.

''He'd wanted to be martyred,'' she said on the show, aired to mark the current season of Ashura, when the world's Shi'ite Muslims commemorate the killing in battle more than 13 centuries ago of the Prophet Mohammad's grandson, Imam Hussein.

This year Ashura has taken on a new dimension for Hezbollah.

The Shi'ite group is not just remembering Hussein and its own guerrillas who died fighting in the July-August war but, with Lebanon in political crisis, has its domestic foes to rail at as well as its regular targets Israel and the United States.

Hussein was killed along with most of his family by the ruler Yazid, whom Shi'ites remember as an oppressor and murderer.

Hussein's death at Kerbala in what is now Iraq in the year 680 is a defining moment in the history of Shi'ite Islam.

Ashura culminates in Lebanon today with processions to mark his martyrdom. Billboards this year describe Ashura as ''The Victory of the Oppressed'', recalling ''The Divine Victory'' that Hezbollah proclaimed over Israel last year.

''The resistance is fully saturated in that religious ethos of victimisation, of oppression, of injustice and the belief that martyrdom will yield victory,'' Amal Saad Ghorayeb, an expert on the group, said.

Hezbollah has always held its slain fighters in high regard.

Their families enjoy great respect -- and financial support --and Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah partly draws his legitimacy from the death of one of his sons in battle in the 1990s.

Hezbollah has not stated how many of its guerrillas died in last year's war, which killed around 1,200 Lebanese, mainly civilians, and 157 Israelis, mainly soldiers. But sources at the group put its death toll at 270.

''VICTORY OF BLOOD OVER THE SWORD'' In chants at Ashura processions, mourners equate Hezbollah's modern-day enemies Israel and the United States with the villainous Yazid.

But Hezbollah's clerical leaders have also used Ashura sermons this year to launch scathing attacks on their US-backed Lebanese political rivals who control government, which they have described as an oppressor, if not a full enemy.

Hezbollah is part of an opposition that wants more say in cabinet. It accuses ruling politicians of failing to back it in last year's war.

''Let us return to the blood of Hussein, the blood of Kerbala ... So we can be victorious, through our injustices and our rights,'' leading Hezbollah cleric Sayyed Hashem Safieddin said at the end of a politically charged Ashura sermon.

''As we were victorious over the Zionist enemy ... we will achieve subsequent victories for Lebanon and our Arab and Islamic nation,'' he told thousands dressed in black to mourn Hussein, whose death is also known as ''The Victory of Blood over the Sword''.

The Lebanese political standoff turned violent last week.

Government and opposition supporters clashed in the street and seven were killed. The rival sides have blamed each other.

Hezbollah has sworn it will not be dragged into a civil war.

''Kill us, spill our blood. You have done that before,'' Nasrallah said in one Ashura address. Addressing the government, he added: ''We are confident that our blood, if you spill it unjustly, will be victorious over your sword and your guns.'' REUTERS PB RK0932