--:-- Aisha Roscoe: Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah has been killed in Israeli strikes on the Lebanese capital of Beirut.
--:-- Scott Simon: Friday's strikes hit several apartment buildings and, according to the Israeli military, targeted Hezbollah's headquarters.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: I'm Aisha Roscoe. And I'm Scott Simon, and this is Up First from NPR News.
--:-- Scott Simon: Nasrallah's killing and the attack on Beirut signaled a major escalation in the fighting between Israel and Lebanon.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: With this, Israel seems to have expanded another major front on its northern border.
--:-- Scott Simon: How does this affect the broader conflict and the Gaza ceasefire talks? We'll tell you more.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: Plus, Hurricane Helene might have been downgraded to a tropical storm, but she still managed to drench North Carolina.
--:-- Scott Simon: So please stay with us. We have the news you need to start your weekend.
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Hezbollah has confirmed that its leader, Hassan Nasrallah, was killed in Israeli airstrikes on Friday night.
--:-- Scott Simon: The killing of a party and militant leader will have major implications for a conflict that threatens to spread throughout the region.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: We now have Jane Araf, our correspondent in Beirut, and Daniel Estrin in Tel Aviv.
--:-- Scott Simon: Thank you both for being with us.
--:-- Jane Araf: Thank you, Scott.
--:-- Daniel Estrin: Thanks, Scott.
--:-- Jane Araf: Jane, let's begin with you there in Beirut. What's the reaction?
--:-- Scott Simon: Oh, gosh. Where do I begin?
--:-- Jane Araf: We are on the Corniche where some people have left after airstrikes in the southern suburbs.
--:-- Scott Simon: Some of the people have even stayed here overnight because there's nowhere to go.
--:-- Jane Araf: And as soon as there was confirmation that Nasrallah had been killed, I don't know if you can hear the woman shouting behind me.
--:-- Scott Simon: We can, yeah.
--:-- Jane Araf: But this started as weeping. There were women weeping in cars.
--:-- Scott Simon: I saw one driving with a poodle next to her who was sobbing at the news.
--:-- Jane Araf: A lot of the women here just can't stop crying.
--:-- Scott Simon: One of them was leaning over the metal railing and shouting at the sea, Seyyid Nasrallah, where are you? Where are you?
--:-- Jane Araf: The grief here is intense.
--:-- Scott Simon: That obviously is not all of Lebanon.
--:-- Jane Araf: There will be some in Lebanon who are celebrating, although certainly not publicly.
--:-- Scott Simon: But certainly for the Shia and even those who are concerned about what comes next.
--:-- Jane Araf: This is a very unsettling day.
--:-- Daniel Estrin: Daniel Estrin in Tel Aviv, what's the reaction been there?
--:-- Scott Simon: So there's a lot of jubilation among many Israelis.
--:-- Daniel Estrin: And the military has published an audio recording, it said was of Israel Air Force chief speaking to a fighter pilot who participated in the operation killing Nasrallah.
--:-- Scott Simon: And the major general said you brought a presentation of victory I hope we very much hope we have cut down this terror organization.
--:-- Shaina Raff: Shaina Raff, what are the implications of Nasrallah's death for Hezbollah?
--:-- Scott Simon: Well, it's certainly a severe blow.
--:-- Shaina Raff: I mean, the fact that he has, he has been the head of Hezbollah for 32 years.
--:-- Scott Simon: Sorry, we're being told to move along, so we're going to do that.
--:-- Shaina Raff: Head of Hezbollah for 32 years, and that's not like being the chairman of a corporation.
--:-- Scott Simon: He is worshipped, in a sense, among many, many people.
--:-- Shaina Raff: What that means for the organization itself, he has a successor.
--:-- Scott Simon: A successor had been named years ago, so there will be somebody stepping in.
--:-- Shaina Raff: But he certainly won't be Hassan Nasrallah.
--:-- Scott Simon: And as we've seen with all of the airstrikes, the exploding pagers, the remarkable intelligence information that must have led to this targeting.
--:-- Shaina Raff: Hezbollah does appear to be reeling from the latest attacks.
--:-- Daniel Estrin: Daniel Estrin in Tel Aviv, how does the Israeli leadership read this?
--:-- Scott Simon: Because on the one hand, They've killed the leader of Hezbollah.
--:-- Daniel Estrin: On the other hand, they must worry about what comes next.
--:-- Scott Simon: Well, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu actually approved this operation as he just finished addressing the United Nations General Assembly.
--:-- Daniel Estrin: He was in New York. His office released a photo of him on the phone there approving the operation.
--:-- Scott Simon: So there is a lot of, there's a feeling of major success in Israel.
--:-- Daniel Estrin: I've been speaking to observers in the region.
--:-- Scott Simon: One of them is Amr al-Sabailah, who is a Jordanian security expert.
--:-- Daniel Estrin: He's been a close observer of Hezbollah.
--:-- Scott Simon: He says the very fact that Nasrallah was killed with other Hezbollah leadership, as Israel has said, shows that he took a major risk to be there with his commanders in Lebanon after these last two weeks of really crippling Israeli attacks.
--:-- Daniel Estrin: Killing top commanders of the organization.
--:-- Amr al-Sabailah: The level of shock among Hezbollah cannot be measured, actually, because simply they never expected that Israel will be the one who initiates and the one who continues and the one who does not stop attacking Hezbollah.
--:-- Scott Simon: I will say that Israeli observers are warning this morning that even if Nasrallah is dead, Hezbollah still possesses a lot of weaponry to threaten Israel.
--:-- Daniel Estrin: And let me ask you both, in turn, beginning with Jane Araf there in Beirut, what are the implications for the conflict widening now?
--:-- Scott Simon: Obviously, Iran's name will get mentioned a lot.
--:-- Jane Araf: It will, and Iran has indicated for going back to the beginning of the war in Gaza last year that it really, really wants to avoid a war that it doesn't believe that it would emerge unharmed from.
--:-- Scott Simon: So we haven't heard very much from Iran about this, but we do know that Iran will act very, very carefully about any possible response.
--:-- Jane Araf: It seems to have been acting very carefully for the last week or so.
--:-- Scott Simon: The Lebanese are worried about it as well.
--:-- Jane Araf: This morning, one of the Lebanese officials said that they had made a decision that Iranian aircraft could not land at the Beirut airport.
--:-- Scott Simon: And that was after Israel made clear that if it saw Iranian cargo planes in any case landing, that it would feel free to see the Beirut airport as a target.
--:-- Daniel Estrin: Daniel Estrin in Tel Aviv, how does this promote or blunt talk of a ceasefire, which the U.S. has been urging?
--:-- Scott Simon: Right. The U.S. had put forth a proposal for a 21-day temporary ceasefire in Lebanon that could lead to diplomatic talks.
--:-- Daniel Estrin: And that could also lead not only to diplomacy and a ceasefire in Lebanon, but also in Gaza.
--:-- Scott Simon: But, of course, ceasefire talks on the Gaza front have all but frozen.
--:-- Daniel Estrin: And the weight has now shifted to Lebanon.
--:-- Scott Simon: We have not seen Hezbollah and Iran retaliating now with significant strikes across Israel following this escalation, following this killing of Nasrallah and in recent weeks and days.
--:-- Daniel Estrin: But the Israeli army has just now announced that they will be restricting gatherings of more than 1,000 people in public gatherings in central Israel.
--:-- Scott Simon: And that signals that Israel is bracing itself potentially for more strikes from, it could be Hezbollah and even farther afield in the region, Yemen, Iraq, and other militias that Iran supports.
--:-- Daniel Estrin: But this is showing that Israel does not fear the consequences of its strikes as it continues escalating those strikes in Lebanon, as we've seen in the past two weeks.
--:-- Scott Simon: Some Israeli observers say this provides a brief window of opportunity for Israel perhaps to develop an exit strategy with regards to the conflict in Lebanon.
--:-- Daniel Estrin: Daniel Lestron in Tel Aviv, Jaina Ruff in Beirut, thanks so much for being on the job for us there.
--:-- Scott Simon: You're welcome. Thank you.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: And NPR will continue to bring you updates on this story throughout the day.
--:-- Scott Simon: You can go to stations.npr.org to find your local NPR station for the latest news.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: Tropical depression Helene toured through large swaths of the southeast this week hitting Florida and parts of Georgia.
--:-- Scott Simon: But it also drenched the mountains of western North Carolina bringing with it devastating flooding.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: Laura Hackett of Blue Ridge Public Radio witnessed the storm and joins us from Asheville, North Carolina.
--:-- Scott Simon: Thanks for being with us.
--:-- Laura Hackett: Good morning, Scott. Thank you for having me on.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: A storm has passed, but the recovery is just beginning.
--:-- Laura Hackett: Yeah, what's hard right now is we just have very limited information about what's happening in our communities.
--:-- Scott Simon: In Asheville, we're just coming off a city-implemented curfew this morning, and so cell service, power, water outages, those are all still happening throughout the region.
--:-- Laura Hackett: There's also been extreme flooding with some parts of town and some communities completely underwater, cars and even shipping containers floating around, and all roads in western North Carolina remain closed.
--:-- Scott Simon: So recovery has really barely started because officials can't even get to those places to assess damage.
--:-- Laura Hackett: You know, mountain roads that are already difficult to traverse have been completely blocked, you know, keeping critical emergency services out.
--:-- Scott Simon: And medical crews are having to navigate fallen trees and extensive flooding throughout the region.
--:-- Laura Hackett: And Laura, how does communications dropping out in this big swath of Appalachia, including the Blue Ridge and Great Smoky Mountains, complicate recovery?
--:-- Scott Simon: Yeah, communication has been such a huge challenge.
--:-- Laura Hackett: I mean, like I said, cell service is out for many counties, tens of thousands of people at the least.
--:-- Scott Simon: In fact we have two rural reporters who currently don't have cell service so we haven't even been able to connect with them to see what they're experiencing in those far out places.
--:-- Laura Hackett: So that lack of service plus all those closed roads means there really no way to call for help no way for folks to let family and friends know they're okay.
--:-- Scott Simon: People are really isolated in a lot of places.
--:-- Laura Hackett: NC Emergency Management says that the infrastructure damage will take time to repair, But there's no specific estimates of time frame of when that communication will come back online.
--:-- Scott Simon: And there were reports yesterday of a possible dam failure at Lake Lure.
--:-- Laura Hackett: Yeah, Lake Lure is about an hour southeast of Asheville, popular tourist resort area.
--:-- Scott Simon: Dirty Dancing was filmed there.
--:-- Laura Hackett: Yesterday, the National Weather Service called for an imminent failure of the dam.
--:-- Scott Simon: And emergency staff went door to door to encourage evacuation in that 1,200-person town.
--:-- Laura Hackett: What ended up happening is that water did flow over, but so far the 100-year-old dam has held.
--:-- Scott Simon: And as of last night, officials from the county have said that engineers have evaluated the dam and determined it's no longer at imminent risk of failure.
--:-- Laura Hackett: And Laura, who seems to have been hit hardest so far?
--:-- Scott Simon: Yeah, and it's still so early to tell because, you know, we have so many of these blackout zones.
--:-- Laura Hackett: But as is often the case, the most vulnerable have been hard hit.
--:-- Scott Simon: So in Asheville, people in temporary shelters in permanent supportive housing were moved quickly by law enforcement and bus to shelters.
--:-- Laura Hackett: I did speak with one family of four who was evacuated from the Super 8 hotel where they are living.
--:-- Scott Simon: They were rushed into a bus with no time to grab their belongings, not even their shoes.
--:-- Laura Hackett: Teenage daughter Haley, knee deep in the water, described that scene in her home.
--:-- Scott Simon: The bed started floating and it kind of scared me too because the water was bubbling and that like freaked me out a little.
--:-- Laura Hackett: So obviously a very scary situation for Haley and the rest of the people in this region.
--:-- Scott Simon: Laura Hackett, who is a reporter with Blue Ridge Public Radio in Asheville, North Carolina.
--:-- Laura Hackett: Laura, thanks so much.
--:-- Scott Simon: And our best wishes to you and your colleagues who are doing such a great job in covering this story.
--:-- Laura Hackett: Thank you so much, Scott.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: And that's Up First for Saturday, September 28th.
--:-- Scott Simon: I'm Aisha Roscoe.
--:-- Scott Simon: And I'm Scott Simon, Michael Radcliffe, and Elena Torek.
--:-- [Production team]
Produced today's podcast, Andrew Craig directed.
--:-- Scott Simon: Our editors were Dee Parvaz, Eric Whitney, and Vincent Nee.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: Ana Glovna is our technical director with engineering support from Nisha Hines, Andy Huther, and Arthur Halliday-Lorent.
--:-- Scott Simon: Evie Stone is our senior supervising editor, Sarah Oliver is our executive producer, and Jim Kane is our deputy managing editor.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: Tomorrow on the podcast, you get those flyers in the mail pushing you to switch your home's energy to solar power.
--:-- Scott Simon: You usually toss them out, right?
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: Well, you can tune in tomorrow to hear the team from Planet Money on where residential solar businesses may have gone wrong and what the future of the industry might be.
--:-- Scott Simon: And even if you don't have solar panels on your roof, you know we'll have some sunshine for you and we're not shady at all.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: Plus all the latest news, movies, and music.
--:-- Scott Simon: Go to stations.npr.org to find your local NPR station so you can tune in to Weekend Edition every Saturday and Sunday morning.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: Here comes the sun. Bring in the sunshine!
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--:-- Scott Simon: That's ZipRecruiter.com slash zip.
