Hezbollah names NEW boss as ageing terrorist who gave chilling TV speech replaces blown-up Nasrallah – but for how long?

By Oliver Harvey, Chief Feature Writer

MORTAL enemies Hezbollah and Israel are on the verge of open warfare, risking a deadly wider conflict in the troubled region.

After decades of bloodshed, the powerful and well-armed Islamist militia has tentacles stretching across the globe.

With Iran's ayatollah as its puppet master, Hezbollah says it has 100,000 fanatical fighters at its call.

Analysts estimate it has as many as 500,000 rockets and ­missiles trained on Israel.

Military expert Professor Michael Clarke told me: “Hezbollah are a formidable force. They’re very well equipped. They’ve got more tunnels than Hamas had.

"The tunnels in Lebanon are burrowed out of rock, and hard to destroy. They have around half a million projectiles that they can fire at Israel.

“If they chose to fire off great ­salvos of these things, a thousand or so at a time, three or four times a day, they are likely to overwhelm Israeli air defences.”

Hezbollah first made their name as a terrorist outfit in 1982 when Israel invaded its northern neighbour Lebanon to root out the Palestine Liberation Organization.

In the bloody fighting, Israel occupied the south of the country and Shia Muslim militias took up arms against the invaders.

Seeing an opportunity to extend its influence, Iran provided funding and training to the group which became known as Hezbollah — meaning Party Of God.

Hell-bent on destroying Israel, it was soon wreaking havoc.

In 1983, it launched a suicide bombing of barracks in the Lebanese ­capital Beirut, ­housing US and French troops, ­leaving more than 300 dead.

The same year, another Hezbollah terrorist drove a van packed with explosives into the compound of the US Embassy in Beirut, killing 63.

The terror group — which is also a political party providing education and health care — developed a taste for ­kidnapping, too.

Then in 2006, a separate full-blown war was triggered by a deadly cross-border raid by Hezbollah.

It was supposed to be a pushover for Israel’s well-trained regular armed forces against a guerilla army.

But as the Israeli tanks rolled into Lebanon they were quickly met with firm resistance.

Hezbollah had tunnelled deep into Lebanon’s craggy hillsides and built well- fortified positions amid its towns and villages.

Rather than the ragtag ­irregulars the Israelis expected, they faced highly trained and well-armed troops with night-vision goggles and sophisticated communications.