After the death of Hamas deputy chief Salah al-Arouri in an alleged Israeli strike, Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah warned Israel against waging war on Lebanon and said that the killing “will not go unanswered and unpunished,” The Times of Israel reported.
“If the enemy thinks of waging a war on Lebanon, we will fight without restraint, without rules, without limits and without restrictions,” Nasrallah said in his address, which had been pre-planned to commemorate the fourth anniversary of the death of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corp general Qassem Soleimani.
“We are not afraid of war,” Nasrallah said, but did not issue a concrete threat.
“For now,” he said, “we are fighting on the frontline following meticulous calculations.”
Both the Iran-backed Lebanese terror group and Hamas have accused Israel of killing Arouri in Dahiyeh, Beirut on Tuesday night, with Nasrallah describing the attack as a “major and dangerous crime” that “will not go unanswered and unpunished”—repeating a threat made by the group itself, The Times of Israel reported.
The strike that killed al-Arouri marked “the first time they target the southern suburbs in this way since 2006,” Nasrallah said, in reference to that year’s Second Lebanon War which saw Beirut’s southern suburbs bombed.
Israel had sent “messages” to indicate it “did not intend to target Lebanon or Hezbollah,” but was rather “settling scores” with Hamas leaders, the Hezbollah leader added.
Hamas deputy leader Saleh al-Arouri was killed in an alleged Israeli drone strike in Beirut on Tuesday, The Times of Israel reported.
The terrorist organisation Hamas has also confirmed that Israel killed its deputy commander, Saleh al-Arouri, in Lebanon earlier tonight.
“The cowardly assassinations carried out by the Zionist occupation against the leaders and symbols of our Palestinian people inside and outside Palestine will not succeed in breaking the will and steadfastness of our people or in undermining the continuation of their valiant resistance,” senior Hamas official Izzat al-Rishq said in a statement, according to The Times of Israel.
However, Israel is yet to comment on the strike that has killed the senior Hamas leader.
