Flights from Baghdad to Beirut are nearly at capacity as airlines increase services ahead of Hezbollah’s terror leader Hassan Nasrallah’s funeral, officials said.
The Iran-backed terror group has called for a huge turnout when Nasrallah, killed in a September Israeli strike, is laid to rest in the Lebanese capital on Sunday.
“Iraqi Airways will increase its flights to Beirut from one flight a day to two, starting on February 20,” said transport ministry spokesperson Maytham al-Safi, citing heightened demand ahead of the funeral.
An Iraqi airline official told AFP that “all seats on Iraqi Airlines flights from Baghdad to Beirut are booked.”
A source from Lebanon’s Middle East Airlines (MEA) reported increased flights between Baghdad and Beirut from Friday to Tuesday.
The airlines’ websites show that Iraqi Airways flights are fully booked until Sunday, with MEA nearly sold out.
Iraqi lawmakers and officials are expected to attend Nasrallah’s funeral privately, an Iraqi official said. Representatives from pro-Iran Iraqi factions, Hezbollah’s longstanding allies in the Tehran-led “axis of resistance,” are also expected to participate.
Beirut airport will be closed for four hours during the funeral.
Hezbollah has said 79 countries would be involved in the commemoration, either officially or through “popular” support.
Sunday’s funeral will also honor Hashem Safieddine, a senior Hezbollah figure who had been chosen to succeed Nasrallah before he was killed in an Israeli strike in October.
After decades at the helm of the group once seen as invincible, the killing of the charismatic Nasrallah sent shock waves across Lebanon and the wider region.
Since Nasrallah’s death, portraits of him, either alone or alongside other slain pro-Iran terror commanders, have been displayed throughout Baghdad and other areas of the Shiite-majority country.
On Sunday afternoon, thousands are expected to attend a “symbolic” procession for Nasrallah in Baghdad’s northwestern neighborhood of Kadhimiya, which is home to a Shiite shrine.
Nasrallah was killed in a huge Israeli airstrike on Beirut’s southern suburbs on September 27, 2024, as Israel scaled up its campaign against the Iran-backed terror group following almost a year of cross-border attacks.
Hezbollah began near-daily attacks on northern Israel one day after the October 7, 2023, attack on Israel by its Palestinian ally Hamas, which triggered the war in Gaza. Some 60,000 Israeli residents of the north were displaced by Hezbollah’s attacks, with rocket fire eventually spreading to the center of the country.
Israel intensified its campaign against Hezbollah in September, launching a series of devastating blows against the group’s leadership and killing its longtime chief Nasrallah before launching a ground invasion in southern Lebanon aimed at securing the border and enabling the return of displaced Israelis.