The Hawk of Lebanon

"The Hawk of Lebanon" is a popular song in the Arab World about Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah. The song was written by little known Palestinian boy band Firkat al-Shamal (Band of the North) at the height of the 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict.

The song is being played on Arab TV networks, used as a ring tone for cell phones, passed around on e-mail and distributed on CDs and tapes. Music stores have trouble keeping up with demand, in part because Israeli soldiers have confiscated some Nasrallah tapes and CDs at checkpoints. Israeli police say the song is considered inflammatory and that tapes and CDs containing it would be confiscated.

The lyrics consist of constant repetition of a few simple rhymes: "Hey, you, hawk of Lebanon. Hey, you, Nasrallah. Your men are from Hezbollah and victory is yours with God's help." Lead singer and manager Alaa Abu al-Haija, 28, said he gives the audiences what they want to hear. "I see people turning toward Islam, so I have to sing to that," said Alaa, sitting in the living room of his family's two-story house in the northern West Bank village of al-Yamun.

Palestinian fever for the song has brought together supporters of Hamas and Fatah who are usually divided in the Palestinian society.

Trivia

• Another song by an Israeli group called "Yalla Ya Nasrallah" was also written about Nasrallah during the same time, however, the song has an alternate view (calling him an orang-utan with lice in his beard) of Hassan Nasrallah.

External links

• The Hawk Of Lebanon MP3
• Police confiscates CDs with “inflammatory song” Freemuse article
• Whole Show Blow-by-Blow
• Hawk of Lebanon
• Lyrics (in Arabic)