Hezbollah leader Naim Qassem said Sunday his group would not surrender or lay down its weapons in response to “Israeli” threats, despite pressure on the Lebanese group to disarm.
“This threat will not make us accept surrender,” Qassem said in a televised speech to thousands of his supporters in the southern suburbs of Beirut, during the Shia Muslim religious commemoration of Ashura.
The Lebanese leaders have repeatedly vowed a state monopoly on bearing arms while demanding “Israel” comply with a November ceasefire that ended the fighting.
Qassem, who succeeded longtime leader Hassan Nasrallah after the Zionist forces killed him in September, said the group’s fighters would not abandon their arms and asserted that the Zionist aggression must first stop.
His speech came as US envoy Tom Barrack was expected in Beirut on Monday.
Lebanese authorities are due to deliver a response to Barrack’s request for Hezbollah to be disarmed by the end of the year, according to a Lebanese official who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Lebanese authorities say they have been dismantling Hezbollah’s military infrastructure in the south near the border.
The Zionist forces launched an assault on Lebanon on Oct. 8, 2023, escalating into a full-scale war by Sept. 23, 2024. More than 4,000 people have been killed, over 17,000 wounded, and nearly 1.4 million displaced, according to official data.
Despite a ceasefire reached last November, the Zionist forces have conducted near-daily attacks in southern Lebanon, claiming they are targeting Hezbollah’s activities.
Lebanese authorities have reported nearly 3,000 “Israeli” violations of the truce, including the deaths of at least 215 people, with more than 500 others injured since the agreement was signed.
