Hezbollah affirms it ‘will not let anybody disarm’ it amid US strain on Beirut

Hezbollah “is not going to let anybody disarm” it, the Lebanese group’s chief Naim Qassem mentioned Friday, as Washington presses Beirut to compel the Iran-backed motion at hand over its weapons.

Hezbollah, lengthy a dominant pressure in Lebanese politics, was left weakened by greater than a 12 months of hostilities with Israel sparked by the Gaza warfare, together with an Israeli floor incursion and two months of heavy bombardment that decimated the group’s management.

The combating was largely dropped at an finish by a November ceasefire, however not earlier than the group’s longtime chief and Qassem’s predecessor Hassan Nasrallah was killed in an Israeli air strike.

“We is not going to let anybody disarm Hezbollah or disarm the resistance” in opposition to Israel, Qassem mentioned in remarks on a Hezbollah-affiliated TV channel.

“We should lower this concept of disarmament from the dictionary.”

His feedback got here hours after one other Hezbollah official mentioned the group refused to debate handing over its weapons until Israel withdrew utterly from south Lebanon and halted its “aggression”.

“It’s not a query of disarming,” Wafic Safa mentioned in an interview with Hezbollah’s Al-Nur radio station.

“What the president (Joseph Aoun) mentioned in his inauguration speech is a defensive technique.”

Safa, believed by specialists to belong to the motion’s most radical faction, mentioned Hezbollah had conveyed its place to Aoun, who on Tuesday mentioned he sought “to make 2025 the 12 months of proscribing arms to the state”.

In his interview, Safa requested: “Wouldn’t it’s logical for Israel to first withdraw, then launch the prisoners, then stop its aggression… after which we talk about a defensive technique?

“The defensive technique is about serious about the best way to defend Lebanon, not getting ready for the get together at hand over its weapons.”

Analysts have mentioned that the once-unthinkable concept of Hezbollah disarming could now not be so, and should even be inevitable.

‘Drawback is Israel’

Beneath the November ceasefire, Israel was meant to withdraw all of its forces from south Lebanon.

However regardless of the deal, its troops have remained at 5 south Lebanon positions that they deem “strategic”.

Israel has additionally continued to hold out near-daily strikes in opposition to Lebanon – together with on Friday – saying it’s concentrating on members of Hezbollah.

Beneath the truce, Hezbollah was to tug its fighters again north of Lebanon’s Litani River and dismantle any remaining navy infrastructure within the south.

Lebanon’s military has been deploying within the south as Israeli forces pulled again.

Hezbollah says the ceasefire doesn’t apply to the remainder of Lebanon, regardless of being based mostly on UN Safety Council Decision 1701, which requires the disarmament of non-state teams.

Hezbollah was the one group to maintain its weapons after Lebanon’s 15-year civil warfare resulted in 1990, saying that they had been for “resistance” in opposition to Israel, which continued to occupy the south till 2000.

US particular envoy for the Center East Morgan Ortagus, who visited Beirut this month, mentioned Washington continued to press Beirut “to completely fulfil the cessation of hostilities, and that features disarming Hezbollah and all militias”.

Safa mentioned on Friday that each Hezbollah and the Lebanese military had been respecting the phrases of the truce.

“The issue is Israel, which has not achieved so,” he mentioned.

On Saturday, a supply near Hezbollah instructed AFP that the group had ceded to the Lebanese military round 190 of its 265 navy positions recognized south of the Litani.

(Apart from the headline, this story has not been edited by Firstpost employees.)