Hezbollah Chief Dismisses Calls for Disarming Resistance

Delivering a live televised address on Friday, Sheikh Naim Qasseim said Hezbollah’s weaponry was solely dedicated to confronting Israeli aggression, roundly refuting claims that the resistance’s arms were a destabilizing factor within Lebanon.

The Hezbollah leader warned that those calling for disarmament of the resistance, particularly through force, were serving the Israeli regime’s agenda.

"Their goal is to create division between the resistance and the army," Sheikh Qassem said, but stressed that "there will be no (such) division.”

"We will not allow anyone to disarm Hezbollah or the resistance. This idea must be erased from your vocabulary."

Sheikh Qassem also issued a stark warning to the Israeli regime, stating that the Lebanese resistance movement has numerous options at its disposal in the face of Tel Aviv’s violations of its ceasefire with the group.

"We have options and we fear nothing. If you persist, you will see, at the right time, what we decide to do," the resistance leader emphasized.

"Anyone who thinks we are weak is delusional," he added.

The remarks came amid the regime’s daily violations of the ceasefire agreement that was clinched late last year with the aim of ending Tel Aviv’s deadly escalation against Lebanon that had claimed the lives of around 4,000 people throughout more than a year.

Sheikh Qassem emphasized that the regime's ongoing efforts to undermine Lebanon's sovereignty and the resistance's presence would face unyielding retaliation.

He stressed that Hezbollah's strength and unity with Lebanon's national army and people ensured that the regime would not achieve its goals.

"We face the occupation through the strength of our position, national unity, building of the army, and readiness of the resistance. We will not, and have never, surrendered," the resistance leader noted. "As long as the resistance exists—and it will remain—alongside the national army, the Lebanese people, and their supporters, Israel will never be able to achieve its objectives."

Sheikh Qassem also condemned the Israeli regime’s ongoing rhetoric regarding “disarmament” of Hezbollah, calling it a thinly-veiled attempt to weaken Lebanon and further Tel Aviv’s expansionist goals.

"Israel is expansionist; it is not content with occupied Palestine and seeks to take Lebanon as well," he explained.

The Hezbollah chief reminded that the resistance in Lebanon was born out of a necessity to confront Israeli occupation and aggression, stating, "The resistance is a response to occupation, and if the Lebanese state is unable to protect the land and its citizens by itself, then it is only natural for the resistance to exist."

The resistance leader reflected on Hezbollah's decades-long history, stating that the movement’s remarkable achievements had been crucial in protecting Lebanon from Israeli aggression.

"The strength of the resistance in Lebanon lies in the great and impactful achievements it has made over the past 40 years," he said, noting that the movement's enduring commitment had prevented Israel from realizing its objectives.

The group deployed its armaments effectively in the face of Israeli wars in 2000 and 2006, forcing the regime into beating a humiliating retreat on both occasions.

Throughout more than a year of intensified Israeli attacks that had begun in October 2023, the movement also successfully staged hundreds of retaliatory strikes against the occupied Palestinian territories, besides thwarting numerous Israeli military incursions.

Sheikh Qassem credited the resistance with securing the ceasefire agreement through its reprisal operations, pointing out that the regime's aggression would not have ceased without Hezbollah's steadfastness.

"Without that resilience, there would have been no agreement, and Israel would have continued its aggression," he noted.

The resistance official, meanwhile, described the United States, the Israeli regime’s most dedicated ally, as “the greatest evil.”

He called the US the sponsor of “the cancerous growth that is Israel, which must be eradicated.”

Sheikh Qassem additionally underlined that Lebanon could not fall under American tutelage, and that Washington had to respect the will of the Lebanese people for independence and refrain from interfering in its affairs.

The official’s remarks concerned efforts by successive American administrations and Washington’s allies to pressure Beirut into trying to marginalize Hezbollah.