Hassan Nasrallah, the secretary general of the Shiite Hezbollah party, has said that the latest attacks by its armed groups on settlements in northern Israel are not yet a response to the killing of military commander Fouad Shokr and Palestinian Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh.
“Strikes on Israel are being prepared from Iran, Yemen and Lebanon. They will certainly be carried out,” said Nasrallah, whose speech was broadcast by Al Manar TV. “Our joint response will be strong, sensitive and effective.”
The Shiite militia was not the initiator of expanding the conflict, he recalled.
“We did not seek military escalation. It was Israel’s decision. It was their choice,” he emphasized. “Now there will be days and nights of battles between us.”
Nasrallah stated that the Shiite fighters possessed the kind of rocket weapons that “would make it possible to destroy several Israeli military factories in less than one hour.”
“The fact that the Israelis have been waiting a week for us to retaliate is part of their punishment,” he said.
On July 31, the radical Palestinian movement Hamas said Politburo Chairman Haniyeh was killed in an Israeli strike on his residence in Tehran, where he had arrived to attend the inauguration Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian.
According to Al Hadath TV channel, Haniyeh lost his life to a direct missile strike.
On July 30, the Israeli army reported a strike on the Lebanese capital and Shokr’s death. According to the Israeli military, Shokr was Nasrallah’s right-hand man.