Lebanon isn’t reacting to the death of Hassan Nasrallah like the rest of the Arab world. Here’s why.

It’s been one week since the assassination of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah. How are Arabic-speaking news outlets and online social discourse reacting? 

Turns out it varies. FilterLabs has followed narratives about Nasrallah’s death across Arabic-language news and social media, using our data platform Talisman. What we found has been somewhat surprising. As our CEO Jonathan Teubner told the New York Times last week, reactions to the Hezbollah secretary-general’s death were not the same throughout the Arab world.

Graphing Sentiment: Lebanon and its Neighbors

In most countries, Nasrallah was lionized as a hero and a martyr. In his native Lebanon, however, the reaction was ambivalent. “Lebanon is more negative overall on Nasrallah than the Arab world more generally,” Teubner told the Times, “because their focus has been on the devastation that has occurred and, in all likelihood, will increase with a ground invasion.”

Compare this chart of sentiment around Nasrallah on Lebanese social media…

…to sentiment in our global Arabic social media feed, which includes online sources such as social media posts, discussion forums, and messaging channels from across the Arabic-speaking world.

Sentiment in Arabic news media from across the region followed a similar pattern to global Arabic social media:

There are two notable features. First, there is a sentiment spike in global Arabic coverage around September 13th. This corresponds to news stories about a letter that Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar sent to Nasrallah thanking him for his support. But Lebanese social media showed no similar sentiment bump. 

Second, sentiment around Nasrallah rose in both the wider Arabic-speaking world and Lebanese social media after his assassination on September 27th. But in global Arabic media the elevated sentiment has persisted. On Lebanese social media, there was a sharp bump—though it still didn’t rise to the level of sentiment on the global Arabic social feed. And it quickly dropped off again. 

In Iranian news, the shifts in sentiment were similar—but average sentiment was higher overall, and has so far stayed very high since Nasrallah’s death. 

Across the region, Nasrallah was praised in highly affective and religious terms. To take only one example, an Iranian Telegram post quoted a letter from Hassan Khomeini (grandson of Ruhollah Khomeini, the first Supreme Leader of Iran) to the Hezbollah leader: “Your struggle against Israel is a source of pride for every Muslim and an honor for every free person. I, like all the sons of the great Khomeini, am honorably at your service. I declare that I am ready to provide any service in defense of Islam.”

What about news coverage in Lebanon? It turns out that mainstream Lebanese news media looks almost exactly like the rest of the Arabic media landscape: 

But again, as we noted above, on Lebanese social media, the Sinwar letter scarcely moved sentiment around Nasrallah at all. Sentiment around him rose after his death, but then fell again.

Digging into the difference

Why was Lebanese social media different? Using Talisman, we took a look at some of the social media artifacts behind the trends in Lebanon. What we found was striking. There was a fair amount of criticism of Nasrallah, especially for his willingness to support President Bashar Al-Assad during the Syrian civil war. Hezbollah’s support of Assad was virtually absent from other Arabic media sources. Lebanese social media also included more coverage of other victims of the Israeli bombings. 

Some Lebanese social media posts even called for Hezbollah to surrender. As one X user tweeted (after the bombing but before confirmation of Nasrallah’s death): “It is very clear that the difference in combat capabilities is large, in favor of Israel. I believe that it is time for Hassan Nasrallah to make a courageous decision and announce the surrender of the party.”

In sum, even as the entire region is on the verge of war, there are still ordinary people hoping to pull back from the brink. 

Take a look for yourself! This is an unfolding story, and new developments and dynamics will arise as we ingest new data and as the online discourse about Nasrallah evolves. You can now view the data yourself on our Nasrallah dashboard on Talisman! (If you aren’t a Talisman subscriber, sign up here.)

New feature: You can now take a closer look at this newsletter’s data in our flagship data analysis platform, Talisman! We’ve built a custom dashboard with all of the charts you’ll see below. If you don’t already have a Talisman subscription, you can sign up here — and for a limited time, a Basic subscription is free.