Beirut, Lebanon – Hezbollah leader Hasan Nasrallah on Friday called for a ceasefire in Gaza while hesitant to announce a broader conflict with Israel, bringing relief to Lebanon where many feared prospects of war.
Nasrallah claimed that the October 7 Hamas attack on southern Israel, which sparked the current war, was carried out without the knowledge of Hezbollah or Iran, in a live televised speech on Friday.
Yet the head of the Iran-backed Shiite political party and armed group also said all options were on the table for intensifying relations with Israel if the crisis in Gaza worsens, in his first comments on the war . Nasrallah placed responsibility for the current carnage in Gaza, where more than 9,000 Palestinians have been killed, on the United States.
“There is fear of an escalation or that the (Lebanese) front will lead to a wider war,” Nasrallah said. “It is possible and the enemy must keep this in mind.”
For now, the war in Lebanon is limited to the southern region. Nasrallah reminded viewers of this. “They say (I) will announce that we will go to war,” he said. But “we entered the battle from October 8.”
More than 70 people have died on the Lebanese side since the start of hostilities. Most of those killed were Hezbollah fighters, but they also included civilians and a Reuters journalist. Israel said six soldiers and one civilian died alongside it, although Hezbollah claims to have killed or injured 120 Israeli soldiers.
On the eve of the speech, the country was worried that Lebanon would enter into a broader confrontation with Israel. For the moment, these fears have been allayed.
“For many Lebanese, they may find some form of comfort in knowing that we are not descending into all-out war,” said Nicholas Blanford, an Atlantic Council expert based in Beirut.
“Nasrallah said Israel’s defeat was a step-by-step approach and would not happen in one fell swoop. »
Some members of Lebanon’s political class, including interim Prime Minister Najib Mikati, have made statements to avoid a wider war. Despite these efforts, many in Lebanon believed that any decision to drag the country into war rested in the hands of one man: Nasrallah.
Lebanon eagerly awaited Nasrallah’s words after the speech was announced on October 29. Before Friday’s speech, many stores in Beirut were closing prematurely. Traffic was sparser than usual as many people left work early or telecommuted.
Group chats exchanged anxious memes or jokes about what Nasrallah would say. Large crowds gathered in the southern suburbs of Beirut, southern Lebanon and the eastern Bekaa Valley to watch the speech. Hezbollah enjoys a popular support base in all three areas.
In a café on Beirut’s waterfront, Haytham smoked a cigarette. “Of course we’re scared,” Haytham said, just minutes before Nasrallah appeared on screen, wearing a black turban and robe. If Nasrallah decided to enter a broader war, “Israel could drop a bomb right here where I am sitting,” he added.
In his speech, Nasrallah detailed actions taken by Hezbollah along the Blue Line – the line that demarcates Lebanon from Israel – and said the current battle was of unprecedented importance.
“What is happening on our front has not happened since 1948, even during the July 2006 war,” Nasrallah said. Days before the speech, Nasrallah signed a handwritten letter demanding that all Hezbollah members killed in operations be declared “martyrs on the road to Jerusalem.”
Nasrallah also said Hamas acted alone on October 7, rejecting suggestions that Iran or Hezbollah helped plan the attack. He also insisted that civilian deaths during the operation were the work of Israel and not Hamas, despite Amnesty International’s claims that they had verified videos showing Hamas shooting and killing civilians. .
Although Nasrallah said the current battle was unprecedented, he used examples from resistance operations from the 1980s and the July 2006 war between Hezbollah and Israel. Despite thousands of casualties – mostly civilians – on the Lebanese side in 2006, Hezbollah’s status was strengthened after withstanding 34 days of war against the Middle East’s most powerful army.
Nasrallah appeared to suggest that if Hamas resisted the Israeli barrage, it would signal a victory for the group similar to that of Hezbollah in 2006. However, Nasrallah also indicated that if the situation worsened in Gaza, it would also intensify in the Lebanese border.
“It’s almost a riposte to criticism from some Hamas leaders that Hezbollah is not doing enough,” Blanford said. “He explained in some detail that Hezbollah’s activities along the border have drawn significant numbers of troops, including elite forces, away from Gaza to man Israel’s northern border. »
Nasrallah appears to indicate that as long as Hamas can resist the Israeli army, there will be no need to intervene. “The elimination of Hamas is an unachievable goal,” Nasrallah said.
Indeed, Blanford said, Nasrallah made it clear that Gaza was still the primary front and that Lebanon’s border with Israel would remain secondary.
“When you stopped all the shooting and bluster, it was rational speech,” Blanford said. At the same time, however, Nasrallah was “obviously not going to reassure the Americans or the Israelis” that escalation could be avoided, he said.
