Hezbollah
pronunciation
How to pronounce Hezbollah in British English:
UK [,hezbə'lɑ:]
How to pronounce Hezbollah in American English:
US
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- Noun:
- a Shiite terrorist organization with strong ties to Iran; seeks to create an Iranian fundamentalist Islamic state in Lebanon; car bombs are the signature weapon
Word Origin
- Hezbollah (n.)
- extremist Shiite group active in Lebanon, founded c. 1982, from Persian hezbollah, Arabic hizbullah, literally "Party of God," from hezb/hizb "party" + allah "God." An adherent is a Hezbollahi. The name of various Islamic groups in modern times, the name itself is attested in English by 1960 in referense to an Indonesian guerilla battalion of 1945 that "grew out of a similarly named organization formed by the Japanese to give training in military drill to young Moslems." In Modjokuto (like Masjumi itself, Hizbullah was Indonesia-wide but, also like Masjumi, it had little effective central organization) this group was led by the present head of Muhammadijah -- the same man who a year or so before was going to Djakarta for propaganda training and studying to be a kamikaze. [Clifford Geertz, "The Religion of Java," Chicago, 1960]
Example
- 1. Would they give nuclear weapons to proxies in hezbollah ?
- 2. The us and israel regard hezbollah as a terrorist organisation .
- 3. While most observers are worried about assad passing these weapons along to third-party actors like hezbollah , he is more likely to hold on tightly to them .
- 4. The museum features different units of hezbollah , including its missile unit .
- 5. The incident occurred during a hezbollah rocket attack .