By Laila Bassam, Tom Perry, Maya Gebeily

BEIRUT (Reuters) – With the bodies of its fighters still scattered on the battlefield, Hezbollah must bury its dead and provide aid to its supporters who bore the brunt of Israel’s offensive as the first steps on a long and expensive road to recovery, four have said senior officials.

Hezbollah believes the number of its fighters killed in the 14 months of hostilities could reach several thousand, with the vast majority killed since Israel went on the offensive in September, three sources familiar with its operations said, citing previously unreported internal estimates.

One source said the Iran-backed group may have lost as many as 4,000 people – more than 10 times the number killed in its month-long 2006 war with Israel. So far, Lebanese authorities have said about 3,800 people have been killed in the current hostilities, without distinguishing between fighters and civilians.

Hezbollah emerges shaken from top to bottom, its leadership still reeling from the killing of its former leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah and its supporters left en masse homeless by the bombing of Beirut’s southern suburbs and the destruction of entire southern villages.

With a ceasefire in place on Wednesday, Hezbollah’s agenda includes working to fully restore its organizational structure, investigating the security breaches that helped Israel deliver so many painful blows, and a full review of the past year, including its mistakes in underestimating Israel’s technological capabilities. said three other sources familiar with the group’s thinking.

For this story, Reuters spoke to a dozen people who collectively provided details on some of the challenges Hezbollah faces as it tries to rebuild itself after the war. Most asked not to be named to talk about sensitive matters.

Hassan Fadallah, a senior Hezbollah politician, told Reuters the priority would be “the people”.

“To shelter you, to remove the rubble, to say goodbye to the martyrs and, in the next phase, to rebuild,” he said.

Israel’s campaign has largely focused on Hezbollah’s Shiite Muslim heartland, where its supporters have been hit hard. These include people still nursing victims of Israel’s attack on its mobile communications devices in September.

“I have a brother who was martyred, a brother-in-law who was wounded in the pager attacks, and my neighbors and relatives are all martyrs, wounded or missing,” said Hawraa, a woman from southern Lebanon with family members fighting for Hezbollah.

“We want to gather our martyrs and bury them… we want to rebuild our homes,” said Hawraa, who remained in her village until she was forced to flee by the Israeli attack in September. She declined to use her full name, citing safety concerns.

The Israeli offensive has displaced more than 1 million people, most from areas where Hezbollah dominates.

A senior Lebanese official familiar with Hezbollah’s thinking said the group’s focus would be squarely on securing their return and rebuilding their homes: “Hezbollah is like a wounded man. A wounded man stands up and fights? A wounded man must tend to his wounds. .”

The official expected Hezbollah to conduct a broad policy review after the war, dealing with all the major issues: Israel, its weapons and the domestic politics of Lebanon, where its weapons have long been a point of contention.

Iran, which founded Hezbollah in 1982, has promised to help rebuild. The costs are immense: the World Bank estimates $2.8 billion in housing damage in Lebanon alone, with 99,000 homes partially or totally destroyed.

The senior Lebanese official said Tehran has a variety of ways to get funds to Hezbollah, without giving details.

Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, a close ally of Hezbollah, is urging wealthy Lebanese Shiites in the diaspora to send funds to help the displaced, two Lebanese officials said.

Officials also expected significant donations from Shia religious foundations in the region.

Hezbollah did not immediately respond to a detailed request for comment for this story. Iran’s foreign ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

THE “RESISTANCE” WILL CONTINUE

Hezbollah has indicated that it intends to keep its weapons, dashing hopes from Lebanese opponents who predicted that the pressures of the war would eventually lead it to hand them over to the state. Hezbollah officials said the resistance – widely understood to mean its armed status – would continue.

Hezbollah opened fire in support of Palestinian ally Hamas on October 8, 2023. Israel went on the offensive against the group in September, declaring its aim to ensure the return home of 60,000 people evacuated from their homes in the north.

Despite the resulting devastation, Hezbollah’s Fadlallah said the resistance of its fighters in southern Lebanon and the rocket group’s stepped-up rescues toward the end of the conflict showed that Israel had failed.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says his campaign has set back Hezbollah by decades, removed its top leaders, destroyed most of its rockets, neutralized thousands of fighters and destroyed infrastructure near the border.

A senior US official said Hezbollah is “extremely weak” at the moment, both militarily and politically. A Western diplomat echoed that assessment, saying Israel has the power and has all but dictated the terms of its withdrawal.

The terms of the ceasefire agreed by Israel and Lebanon call for Hezbollah to have no military presence in an area between the Israeli border and the Litani River, which meets the Mediterranean Sea about 30 km (20 miles) from the border.

Hezbollah, which approved the deal, has not said how it plans to help implement those conditions, including whether it actively hands over weapons to Lebanese troops deploying in the south or leaves the weapons for soldiers to find.

Israel complains that Hezbollah, which is deeply rooted in southern Lebanon, never implemented the same conditions when they agreed to end a previous war in the 2006 war. Israel says the group was preparing for a large-scale assault in northern Israel, pointing to its military build-up on the border.

Andreas Krieg of King’s College London said Hezbollah retained considerable capability.

The performance of “basic infantry fighters in southern Lebanon and rocket attacks deep into Israeli territory in recent days have shown that the group is still very, very capable,” he said.

“But Hezbollah will be very much blocked in the effort to rebuild the infrastructure and also, most importantly, in securing the funds to do so,” he said.

“REMAINING THE DEBT”

Hezbollah has handed out cash to people affected by the hostilities since they began, paying $200 a month to civilians who remained in frontline villages and giving more as people were forced to leave the areas, according to recipients.

Since the escalation began in September, Hezbollah has paid around $300 a month to help displaced families.

The group has made no secret of the military and financial support it receives from Iran, which sent huge amounts of cash in 2006 to help the homeless and aid in reconstruction.

Hezbollah supporters say more will be on the way. One, citing conversations with a local Hezbollah official, said the group would cover a year’s rent for the homeless in addition to furniture costs.

Addressing the Lebanese people in a sermon in October, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said that “the destruction will be replaced… repaying the debt of the wounded, the bleeding of Lebanon is our duty…”.

The World Bank, in a preliminary estimate, put the cost in damages and losses to Lebanon at $8.5 billion, a bill that cannot be paid by the government, still reeling from a catastrophic financial collapse five years ago.

Gulf states Qatar, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia helped foot the $5 billion reconstruction bill in 2006, the last time Hezbollah and Israel went to war. But there has been no sign that these Sunni-led Arab states are ready to do so again.

Hezbollah carried out a lot of reconstruction work after the 2006 war, financed by Iran and using its construction wing. The project was directed by Sayyed Hashem Safieddine, a Hezbollah leader killed by Israel 11 days after Nasrallah, in a sign of the greater challenges he will face this time around.

“For Hezbollah, the priority is to guarantee the loyalty of the Shia community. The destruction has been enormous and will have an impact on the organization,” said Mohanand Hage Ali of the Carnegie Middle East Center.

(Reporting by Laila Bassam, Tom Perry and Maya Gebeily in Beirut; Additional reporting by Parisa Hafezi; Writing by Tom Perry; Editing by Frank Jack Daniel)