Nasrallah reaffirms Hezbollah's battle is tied to people, resistance in Gaza

By Wesam Bahrani

The Zionist terrorist attacks in Lebanon on Tuesday and Wednesday, which led to thousands of casualties, could potentially have been the worst terrorism in the history of the Arab country.

“Had it not been for Allah's mercy, more than 4,000 Lebanese people would have been killed in two minutes, one minute on Tuesday and in one minute on Wednesday, and that is what the enemy intended,” said Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah in his speech on Wednesday afternoon. 

He acknowledged that the device detonations represented a severe blow to the resistance movement in Lebanon, the movement that has protected the Arab country for more than four decades.

He noted that in a battle "sometimes we have the upper hand, sometimes our enemy does". 

For the supporters of Hezbollah and those of its enemies‌, the remarks provide that extra substance of belief in the movement’s active military front. This is the evidence of who the Hezbollah leader is.

He didn't hide anything about the acts of Zionist terrorism inflicted on thousands of Lebanese citizens, including civil defense and medical practitioners who suffered grievous injuries.

A day after his speech, Hezbollah fired hundreds of rockets targeting new Zionist military posts and bases for the first time. 

On Friday, the Israeli regime carried out another dastardly terror attack in the southern suburbs of Beirut, assassinating top-ranking Hezbollah commanders, including Ibrahim Aqil.

In response, the Lebanese resistance movement pounded many Israeli military targets in the occupied territories, including Ramat David airbase and military airport as well as the Rafael arms manufacturing firm, both deeply involved in the Israeli-American genocide in Gaza.

Nasrallah's speech on Wednesday provided indications and signs of what lies in store for the Israeli regime and settlers who have been displaced from northern occupied territories.

The speech also offered more important insight. He referred to the terror attacks as a "declaration of war" and a breach of “redlines” defined by the resistance amid the genocide in Gaza.

“We will keep this among the brothers. Not even all of Hezbollah. Only the inner circle,” the Hezbollah leader spoke of the retaliation in his characteristic inimitable way.

The attack in the early hours of Sunday against the Rafael arms manufacturing company near occupied Haifa was the “initial reaction” to the device detonations carried out on Tuesday and Wednesday.

No doubt, this is just the start of Hezbollah's escalation. The Zionists will escalate too, as they did on Friday by assassinating Aqil and eleven others in a cowardly indiscriminate airstrike.

Martyrdom is the destiny of all within the Axis of Resistance. Hezbollah takes pride in its martyrs who defend Lebanon on the path to liberating occupied al-Quds. Their names and photographs were published instantly. 

The retaliation to the terror attacks, judging by the movement’s track record will come in a calculated manner that matches the level of carnage that has been inflicted on the Lebanese nation. 

Over the past eleven months, the Zionists have been demanding Hezbollah move its Radwan forces behind the Litani. This was always a pipedream and is no longer a condition as a result of Hezbollah's steadfastness on the Lebanese front. 

What Netanyahu needs much more desperately is for Hezbollah to end its military operations in solidarity with Gaza so that 300,000 settlers, displaced for nearly one year now, can return to northern occupied Palestine. 

In return, over the past months, Netanyahu repeatedly told US mediator Amos Hochstein that the Zionist forces would withdraw from all of the occupied Lebanese areas, including the Shebaa farms.

And that indirect talks would take place over the occupied Lebanese section of the Golan Heights. 

Nasrallah responded to it. He said the Lebanese resistance took on a moral duty on October 8, 2023, over the Gaza genocide and will continue the battle in solidarity with Gaza until there is a ceasefire.

Until that takes place, the Hezbollah leader made clear that even if the Zionists kill 1000‌, 10,000, or 100,000 Hezbollah soldiers, the movement won't retreat. And, he promised this "on behalf of those dead or injured" in Zionist terror attacks. 

“In the name of the martyrs, the wounded, the ones who lost their eyes and palms, and in the name of every person who has taken on the responsibility of supporting Gaza, we tell Netanyahu and Gallant: the Lebanese front will not stop until the war on Gaza ends,” he emphasized.

“We will grow more steadfast and determined to overcome all perils, and it is of great importance that such blows do not undermine our will.”

This essentially means Hezbollah will respond in ways that the regime in Tel Aviv cannot imagine.

Nasrallah's message to his supporters in Lebanon and his enemies in Tel Aviv, Washington, and "NATO" is that Hezbollah will show no weakness and will not retreat.

Displaying weakness at this stage, taking a step back, or pausing is something the Hezbollah hierarchy has never done since 1982. If it does, the US-backed Zionist regime will return its tanks to Beirut.

Nasrallah says if the Zionists want to invade Lebanon, "they are more than welcome" and "would be doing us a great favor" because in northern occupied Palestine, their army has gone into hiding, and Hezbollah is spending more hours hunting them down. 

He hastened to add that the equation, nearly one year since the launch of the Operation al-Aqsa Flood, has changed, pointing out that even if the Zionist regime wages a full-scale war on Lebanon, Hezbollah's operations in occupied Palestine will continue. 

And that essentially means settlers still won't return. 

The speech was reminiscent of the Hezbollah leader’s first speech after the July 2006 Israeli war, when he declared that if the whole world wages war on Lebanon, the Israeli captives would not be freed. 

On Thursday, he reiterated that no matter what happens, the settlers in northern occupied Palestine will not be returning until a ceasefire is reached in Gaza, and one that is acceptable to the Palestinian resistance. 

Hezbollah Secretary-General is openly stating to the region, and beyond that, that Hezbollah's battle is intertwined with the people and resistance in Gaza.

Lebanon and the Lebanese resistance and people stand firmly with Palestine and the Palestinian resistance and people against the child-murdering Israeli apartheid regime.

Wesam Bahrani is an Iraqi journalist and commentator.

(The views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of Press TV.)

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