Hezbollah leader gave speech: "We are not ruling out any options"
Published November 3, 2023 at 3:27 p.m
FOREIGN. Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of the Lebanese Shia militia Hezbollah, gave a speech on Friday afternoon. He threatened the United States and declared that he does not rule out any options in the fight against Israel.

Large crowds gathered in Lebanon's capital Beirut to listen to the televised speech, which the rest of the world has eagerly awaited.

Earlier information in the Arab media had claimed that Hassan Nasrallah would declare full-scale war against Israel if there was no cease-fire in Gaza on Friday.

However, the speech was more subdued, with Nasrallah instead focusing on highlighting successes Hezbollah has already achieved through its limited attacks on Israel since October 8.

He stated, among other things, that half of the Israeli army has been forced to the border with Lebanon, including elite forces, and therefore cannot be used in Gaza. Tens of thousands of Israeli settlements have been forced to evacuate.

However, Hassan Nasrallah noted that it is a "realistic expectation" from the West that it could escalate into a full-scale war, and that this has important psychological effects. It also deters Israel from attacking Lebanon, the Hezbollah leader claimed.

- We do not rule out any alternatives.

He also threatened to attack US warships in the Mediterranean.

Nasrallah said in his speech that no one in the world was doing anything about the situation in Gaza, and that the October 7 attack by Hamas was therefore necessary. However, he emphasized that the operation was entirely planned and carried out by actors inside Palestine, and claimed that it was Israel that was behind the killing of civilians.

- It was a heroic act that we must pay tribute to. It has caused an earthquake in the Israeli entity and revealed that Israel is weaker than a spider's web.

The Hezbollah leader emphasized that Israel was completely taken to bed and, among other things, needed the immediate support of the United States and the West to try to regain the initiative after the incident.

He stated that the losses on the Palestinian side after the attack have been necessary to "begin a new phase of the Palestinian struggle".

- There was no other option. The only other option was to wait in silence to die. So this was the right, necessary step to take, said Hassan Nasrallah.

Nasrallah called the United States "the great Satan" and singled out the superpower for being responsible, through its unconditional support, for what Israel is doing to continue.