Hezbollah has held a mass funeral in south Lebanon’s Kfar Sir for more than a dozen fighters killed during more than six weeks of fighting with Israel, AFP reports.

Hezbollah has not provided the total number of its fighters killed since Israel launched a massive wave of strikes and a ground invasion of Lebanon last month.

But it said it would hold funerals for fighters in the town of Kfar Sir, returning “a group of blessed souls to the soil of the south”.

People flocked to the centre of the village, which was decorated with Hezbollah flags and pictures of those killed, AFP correspondents report.

Men, women and children thronged the streets as 14 coffins, covered in Hezbollah flags, entered on an open truck adorned with flowers, before being taken in a procession to the cemetery.

Women stood on balconies and threw rose petals onto the coffins as they passed through the village, parts of which were damaged.