MP Hassan Fadlallah speaking from south Lebanon on Monday. Photo sent by Mountasser Abdallah.
BEIRUT — Hezbollah MP Hassan Fadlallah said Monday that Israel is “taking advantage of the Lebanese state’s inability to establish protective deterrents, a balance of power, and mechanisms to confront and prevent aggression on Lebanese territory.”
“Of course, we are not asking the Lebanese state — given the current circumstances and lack of military parity — to confront the Israeli army militarily,” he said. “But it can mobilize all its political, popular, security, and media assets to pressure the countries that sponsored the cease-fire.”
Fadlallah spoke during a ceremony marking the first anniversary of the death of a senior Hezbollah official in the southern village of Adsheet, in the Marjayoun district. He cited Israel’s ongoing attacks in southern Lebanon and the southern suburbs of Beirut, most recently airstrikes last Thursday, despite the Nov. 27 cease-fire that ended the war between Israel and Hezbollah.
He also criticized Israel’s continued occupation of five positions in southern Lebanon that it considers “strategic,” calling it a violation of the cease-fire.
Fadlallah also addressed growing internal and international calls for Hezbollah’s disarmament. He said Lebanese officials often cite the ministerial statement to justify policy, but overlook its stated priorities: “protecting Lebanon’s sovereignty, reconstruction, defending borders through the state, liberating occupied Lebanese territory by all means, and then discussing a defense strategy that incorporates the assets offered by the resistance.”
His comments reflect Hezbollah’s interpretation of the statement and were seen as a direct response to disarmament demands. The issue of weapons being held exclusively by the Lebanese state is referenced in the cease-fire agreement, the ministerial statement, and in President Joseph Aoun’s inaugural speech.