The Fathallah barracks were the early headquarters of the

Hezbollah Hezbollah (; ar, حزب الله ', , also transliterated Hizbullah or Hizballah, among others) is a Lebanese Shia Islamist political party and militant group, led by its Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah since 1992. Hezbollah's parami ...

organisation, situated in the Basta neighbourhood of West

Beirut Beirut, french: Beyrouth is the capital and largest city of Lebanon. , Greater Beirut has a population of 2.5 million, which makes it the third-largest city in the Levant region. The city is situated on a peninsula at the midpoint o ...

. On 22 February 1987, following the defeat of the

Amal Militia The Lebanese Resistance Regiments ( ar, أفواج المقاومة اللبنانية , ''ʾAfwāj al-Muqāwama al-Lubnāniyya'', ʾAMAL), also designated Lebanese Resistance Battalions, Lebanese Resistance Detachments, Lebanese Resistance Leg ...

by a combination of

Druze The Druze (; ar, دَرْزِيٌّ, ' or ', , ') are an Arabic-speaking esoteric ethnoreligious group from Western Asia who adhere to the Druze faith, an Abrahamic, monotheistic, syncretic, and ethnic religion based on the teachings of ...

and

Communist Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a s ...

street fighters, 7,000 Syrian commandos moved into

West Beirut Beirut, french: Beyrouth is the capital and largest city of Lebanon. , Greater Beirut has a population of 2.5 million, which makes it the third-largest city in the Levant region. The city is situated on a peninsula at the midpoint o ...

for the first time since 1982. On 24 February the Basta HQ was taken over by the Syrians after an incident in which a Syrian soldier was wounded in the leg. At least 20 young Hizbollah supporters were taken prisoner and executed. Other sources put the number of victims as twenty seven, twenty three men and four women. Fifty thousand people attended their funeral. The killings put intense strain on the relationship between Iran and Syria and under pressure from Tehran the Syrian army stopped further activity in Beirut's Southern suburbs with its population of 800,000 Shiites.Middle East Contemporary Survey
/ref> Hezbollah's headquarters were later moved to secret locations in

Dahieh Dahieh ( ar, الضاحية الجنوبية, lit=the southern suburb, french: Banlieue Sud de Beyrouth, Dâhiye de Beyrouth) is a predominantly Shia Muslim suburb, located south of Beirut, in the Baabda District of Lebanon. It is composed of sev ...

, a suburb of

References

{{reflist Hezbollah Headquarters of political parties Buildings and structures in Beirut