Hezbollah signals Lebanon truce depends on Gaza, says it aims to cause Israel pain
Terror group’s deputy head Naim Qassem says ceasefire is the only solution to the conflict, argues Hezbollah has right to strike all over Israel since IDF hitting all over Lebanon
BEIRUT, Lebanon — Hezbollah’s deputy chief Naim Qassem said on Tuesday his group has adopted “a new calculation” to inflict pain on Israel, even as he called for a ceasefire and seemed to relink cessation of hostilities in Lebanon with a truce in Gaza, after an official in the terror group recently said it could give up its longstanding linkage between the two fronts.
“The solution is a ceasefire, we are not speaking from a position of weakness,” Qassem said.
“If the Israelis do not want that, we will continue,” he added in a broadcast speech that drew a reaction from Israel’s president threatening to eventually kill Qassem.
The top Hezbollah figure did, however, indicate that the group’s willingness to agree to a ceasefire was conditional on an end to fighting in Gaza, where Israel has been at war with Hamas for more than a year.
“We were asked to stop the fighting and get more than 10 kilometers away from the border so as not to provoke Israel, but we stuck to our demand for a ceasefire in Gaza and didn’t agree to the request to separate Lebanon from Gaza,” he asserted.
He added that Hezbollah supports “the Palestinians and aids them in distancing the danger from them and preventing Israel’s expansion.”
Israel does not aim to annex the Gaza Strip, which it evacuated in 2005 in the Disengagement plan, though far-right officials have been demanding continued Israeli presence there. In its war with Hamas, Israel instead aims to dismantle the terrorist organization’s military governance capabilities after its unprecedented October 7, 2023, attack in which terrorists murdered some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took 251 hostages, the recovery of whom is another goal of the war.
Qassem said Tuesday that some 60,000 residents of northern Israel who evacuated last year, after Hezbollah began its near-daily rocket and drone attacks in support of Hamas, would be able to return home after a ceasefire deal is reached through an indirect agreement.
But he threatened that more Israelis would be displaced if the war continued, saying that “the number of uninhabited settlements will increase, and hundreds of thousands, even more than two million, will be in danger at any time, at any hour, on any day.”
He claimed that since Israel has attacked all over Lebanon, the group has the right to attack anywhere in Israel.
“We will focus on targeting the Israeli military and its centers and barracks,” he said, adding that “Hezbollah is strong despite the tough hits we’ve taken, and we’ve recovered our capabilities on the battlefield.”
President Isaac Herzog reacted to Qassem’s speech while visiting the Haifa area and meeting hospitalized soldiers injured in Hezbollah’s drone strike.
“I heard Naim Qassem’s speech — he is wrong just like his predecessors and those who came before them,” he said. “Not only is he wrong — I presume his day will come as well.”
“He’s not only wrong in his disrespect to the State of Israel and its citizens,” Herzog added. “He is trying to make people forget the bitter truth — he and his friends have brought disaster upon Lebanon.”
Israel launched a major offensive against the Iran-backed Hezbollah on September 23 with the aim of allowing residents of northern Israel to return to homes they had been forced to evacuate during a year of cross-border rocket fire from Lebanon.
Beginning with heavy strikes that killed the vast majority of Hezbollah’s leadership, including leader Hassan Nasrallah, Israel proceeded to launch a limited ground offensive in southern Lebanon to dismantle the terrorist organization’s infrastructure along the border, which violates a 2006 UN Security Council stipulating that Hezbollah withdraw to some 30 kilometers north of the border.
Israeli strikes have killed at least 2,309 people in Lebanon over the last year, mainly in the last few weeks, according to the Lebanese government. The number includes at least 960 Hezbollah terrorists the IDF said it had killed in the last year but likely includes many more as the numbers of slain Hezbollah members have not been consistently updated since the beginning of the ground operation.
Meanwhile, more than 1.2 million Lebanese have been displaced. Addressing them, Qassem said they “must be patient to achieve victory, and I promise you will return to your homes that will be rebuilt.”
More than 50 IDF soldiers have been killed in the past year in Hezbollah’s attacks and in the ground operation.
The attacks on northern Israel over the last year have resulted in the deaths of 28 civilians. In addition, 38 IDF soldiers and reservists have died in cross-border skirmishes and in the ensuing ground operation launched in southern Lebanon in late September.