Hezbollah chief Nasrallah says Israel should be ‘afraid’ of all-out war | News on the Israel-Palestine conflict

Hassan Nasrallah says an invasion of northern Israel is quite possible if a major conflict is forced upon Lebanon.

Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah has issued a stern warning to Israel, threatening war “without restrictions, without rules and without limits” in the event of a major Israeli offensive against Lebanon.

Nasrallah’s comments on Wednesday come at a time of rising tensions on the Lebanese-Israeli border after Israeli officials repeatedly said the country was ready for an all-out war against Hezbollah.

“Everything the enemy says and the threats and warnings of the mediators – and what is said in the Israeli media about a war in Lebanon – do not scare us,” Nasrallah said in a speech via video link.

He said Israel was the party that should be “afraid.”

Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz on Tuesday raised the possibility of a wider conflict with the Lebanese group after Hezbollah released drone surveillance footage showing key infrastructure and military facilities in northern Israel.

“We are on the verge of deciding to change the rules against Hezbollah and Lebanon. In an all-out war, Hezbollah will be destroyed and Lebanon will be hit hard,” Katz wrote in a social media post.

“The State of Israel will pay a price on the fronts and at home, but with a strong and united nation and the full power of the (Israeli military), we will restore security to the people of the north.”

On Wednesday, Nasrallah highlighted Hezbollah’s military capabilities, saying the group had acquired new weapons and had a variety of drones that it manufactured locally.

“The enemy knows perfectly well that we have prepared for the most difficult days,” he said. “The enemy knows perfectly well what awaits him, and that is why he has been deterred so far. And he knows that there will be no place in the (country) that will be spared from our missiles and drones. And it will not be an indiscriminate bombing: every missile – a target.”

Nasrallah also suggested that Hezbollah could send ground troops into Israeli territory.

“The enemy is very afraid that the resistance could invade northern Israel. This possibility remains if war is imposed on Lebanon,” he said.

The Iranian-allied Lebanese organization began attacking military bases in northern Israel the day after the Gaza war broke out on October 7, describing them as a “support front” supporting armed Palestinian groups.

Nasrallah stressed that the Lebanese front is making a difference in the broader confrontation with Israel and is withdrawing Israeli military resources from Gaza.

Threat to Cyprus

Nasrallah also issued a warning to Cyprus, a European Union member located in the eastern Mediterranean west of the Lebanese and Israeli coasts.

He said the group had information that Israel was conducting military exercises in Cyprus on terrain similar to that in southern Lebanon.

Nasrallah added that Israel plans to use airports and bases in Cyprus for military purposes if its military infrastructure is attacked in the course of a larger war.

“Opening Cypriot airports and bases to the Israeli enemy to attack Lebanon means that the Cypriot government has become part of the war and the resistance will deal with it as part of the war,” he said, without elaborating.

Nasrallah also warned that the group would open a maritime front against Israel in the Mediterranean.

He added that Hezbollah would continue its attacks on Israeli targets and said the solution to the crisis was “clear”: ending Israel’s war on Gaza.

According to Palestinian health authorities, more than 37,000 people have been killed in the Israeli attack on Gaza since October.

Israel launched the war on October 7 after Hamas, the Palestinian group that governs the Gaza Strip, led an attack on southern Israel that left at least 1,139 people dead and about 250 others captured, according to an Al Jazeera count based on Israeli statistics.

Nasrallah defended Hamas, which made its own demands regarding a multi-stage US-led proposal that Washington said would lead to a “permanent ceasefire.”

He said the US plan had an “obvious” loophole that would allow Israel to resume the war after the first phase of the proposal, which would also include the release of some Israeli prisoners held by Hamas.