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Source: https://jcfa.org/the-classroom-of-the-resistance-how-hizbullah-built-lebanons-most-powerful-weapon/
The Classroom of the Resistance: How Hizbullah Built Lebanon's Most Powerful Weapon
(Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs) Col. (ret.) Dr. Jacques Neriah - Hizbullah has spent four decades cultivating ideological loyalty, political influence, and future generations of supporters. The 1926 Lebanese Constitution guaranteed religious communities the right to run their own schools. With the emergence of Hizbullah, religious education among the Shiites of Lebanon shifted to a political mobilization project funded by Iran. Former Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah frequently highlighted the strategic expansion of Hizbullah's private school networks (such as the Al-Mahdi and Al-Mustafa schools) as an extension of the group's core military and ideological mission. Nasrallah also framed the role of educators and religious leaders as a vanguard responsible for shaping public perception. Sheikh Naim Qassem, today Hizbullah's secretary general, is one of the founders of the Al-Mustafa school network, which caters primarily to the Shiite middle class and families of senior cadre. Hizbullah schools operate under directives of detachment from national identity. Values are adapted to promote ideas from outside the Lebanese national context. Education is not a tool for critical thinking but for "molding" the individual. There is one absolute truth, and all competing narratives are suppressed. Youth are taught that the highest achievement is self-sacrifice for the cause. Education systems identify a clear enemy to foster group cohesion through shared hatred. These institutions are designed to transform the Shiite community into a disciplined, ideologically uniform base, ensuring that the party's survival is anchored in the minds of the next generation. Hizbullah views education as a primary pillar of societal engineering and the building of a "resistance society." The writer, a special analyst for the Middle East at the Jerusalem Center, was formerly Deputy Head for Assessment of Israeli Military Intelligence.