Hezbollah’s leader vowed a fight without rules and without red lines if full-scale war broke out between the Lebanese militant group and Israel, and warned Cyprus against wading into the conflict.
Lebanon and Israel have engaged in regular cross-border firefights in the Gaza Strip since the start of the Jewish state’s war against the Palestinian militant group Hamas – which, like Hezbollah, is backed by Iran. Firefights have intensified since an Israeli air strike last week killed a senior Hezbollah commander, Taleb Sami Abdullah, along with three other group activists.
In a televised address at the official’s memorial service on Wednesday, Hezbollah Secretary-General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah said: “Israel knows very well that no place will be safe from our missiles and drones” in the event of a war between the neighboring states, according to the statement’s comments Hezbollah-allied news channel al-Manar TV.
He added that Hezbollah had now “received new weapons,” but gave no further details. According to Seth Frantzman, an associate fellow at the U.S.-based think tank Foundation for Defense of Democracies, the group frequently uses missiles, anti-tank missiles and Burkan missiles with heavy warheads modeled on Iran’s Ababil drones.
According to the Associated Press, Nasrallah stated that Hezbollah’s number was now “well over 100,000 fighters,” after initially stating that they would reach that threshold in 2021. The secretive nature of the group – which wields significant political, military and social influence in Lebanon – makes the numbers difficult to verify. According to data portal IndexMundi, Lebanon’s formal armed forces are estimated to number around 80,000 soldiers.
The Hezbollah leader also threatened war against the Mediterranean island of Cyprus if the European Union member allows Israel to launch military operations from its territory. Nasrallah accused Israel of “carrying out maneuvers in preparation for the Lebanon war” in Cyprus, without revealing his sources.
“I say that the Cypriot government must be careful because opening airports for the enemy to attack Lebanon means that Cyprus is part of the war and we will deal with it as part of the war,” al-Manar quoted Nasrallah as saying a Google translation.
Cyprus has rejected the allegations, but increased defense cooperation and only took part in joint military exercises with Israel in May 2023.
In response to Nasrallah, Cyprus President Nikos Christodoulides stressed on Wednesday that his country was not involved in the conflict and was rather part of the solution, according to the Cyprus News Agency.
CNBC has asked the Cypriot Foreign Ministry for comment on whether Cypriot sites are being used for Israeli military activities.
A man waves a flag of the Hezbollah movement as its leader Hassan Nasrallah delivers a televised address in Kherbet Selm, southern Lebanon, on January 14, 2024, marking the week-long day of remembrance since the assassination of top field commander Wissam Tawil.
Mahmoud Zayyat | Afp | Getty Images
Nasrallah’s speech fuels increasingly heated rhetoric over the past week, as a surge in missile trade between Israel and Lebanon raises concerns about a wider conflict in the Middle East.
Earlier this week, Hezbollah released a video purportedly taken by its surveillance drones showing military sites in the Israeli port of Haifa. In response, the Israel Defense Forces said on Tuesday that “operational plans for an offensive in Lebanon have been approved and validated and decisions have been made to further increase the readiness of troops on the ground,” without elaborating on the scale of the initiative this would involve a deployment of troops across the border.
Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz also warned that his country was now “very close to the decision to change the rules against Hezbollah and Lebanon.”
U.S. efforts to defuse the conflict and give traction to its peace framework for the Gaza enclave have so far proven futile, with senior White House envoy Amos Hochstein meeting with leaders in Israel and the United States earlier this week Lebanon hit.
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2024-06-20 10:32:13
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