Solidarity demonstration with Iran in the southern suburbs of Beirut, on June 20, 2025. (Credit: Mohammad Yassin/L'Orient-Le Jour)
Hezbollah condemned "with the greatest firmness" the U.S. strikes on Iranian nuclear sites, while maintaining ambiguity regarding the party's direct involvement in the war between Iran and Israel, after several hours of silence.
Secretary-General Naim Qassem stated on June 19 that Hezbollah would act as it deemed "appropriate in the face of this barbaric Israeli-American aggression" and that it stands "alongside Iran in the face of this global injustice" attributed to the United States and Israel. Meanwhile, President Joseph Aoun, Prime Minister Nawaf Salam and Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri have ruled out Lebanon's entry into a new war in separate statements.
The party described the American attack as a "foolish and dangerous escalation, thoughtless, which risks widening the circle of war and plunging the region and the world into the unknown if it is not immediately stopped and firmly condemned." On the night of June 22, the United States conducted unprecedented strikes on Iran, targeting three nuclear sites: the Fordow facility, buried between 80 and 110 meters under a mountain, a larger enrichment plant at Natanz that Israel hit a few days ago, and a third site near the ancient city of Isfahan.
For the party, this operation dubbed "Midnight Hammer" "reveals the true face of the United States, which represents the greatest threat to regional and international security and stability," constituting a "blatant violation of international law." Hezbollah added that this attack aimed to achieve what Israel could not accomplish militarily: weakening Iran and breaking its sovereign will.
"The shameless treachery and deception practiced by U.S. President Donald Trump, driven by his illusions of dominance and arrogance, and this madness of attacking a sovereign state by bombing its peaceful nuclear facilities yet placed under the monitoring of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), confirm that the United States, along with the tyrants of global arrogance, seek only to subordinate free and independent nations to their hegemony by imposing an iniquitous choice on them: either submission and humiliation, or death and destruction," the statement said.
"This attack confirms the total and direct complicity between the United States and Israel in planning and executing not only the war against the Islamic Republic but also in all the wars and crimes perpetrated in the region — in Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, and Yemen — proving to the entire world that the United States is the official sponsor of terrorism, respecting neither international treaties, nor humanitarian laws, nor commitments or obligations," Hezbollah added.
Hezbollah stated that Iran has always favored the diplomatic route and respect for international law while defending its legitimate rights, but that in the face of this aggression Tehran "fully retains the right to retaliate and defend its land, its people, and its sovereignty."
"We also call on the United Nations, international and legal bodies, particularly the International Atomic Energy Agency, to assume their responsibilities in the face of this serious aggression that could have led to nuclear contamination threatening the security of vast regions of the world and costing the lives of tens of thousands of people, without the preventive measures taken by Iran," the statement said.
Following the large-scale Israeli attack on Iran on the night of June 13, Hezbollah stated that it would not unilaterally attack Israel. Government sources indicated they had exerted pressure on the party to prevent its involvement in the conflict. On Oct. 8, 2023, following the Hamas attack in Israel, Hezbollah opened a "support front" to the Palestinian movement, which triggered a little over a year of devastating war in Lebanon.
This article was originally published in French in L'Orient-Le Jour.
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