BEIRUT (AP) — The chief of Lebanon’s Hezbollah group held talks on Wednesday with senior Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad figures in a key assembly of three top anti-Israel militant groups amid the war raging in Gaza.
A quick assertion following the assembly stated that Hezbollah’s chief Hassan Nasrallah agreed with Hamas’ Saleh al-Arouri and Islamic Jihad’s chief Ziad al-Nakhleh on the following steps that the three — alongside with different Iran-backed militants — ought to take at this “delicate stage.”
Their objective, based on the assertion that was carried on Hezbollah-run and Lebanese state media, was to realize “an actual victory for the resistance in Gaza and Palestine” and halt Israel’s “treacherous and brutal aggression in opposition to our oppressed and steadfast individuals in Gaza and the West Financial institution”.
No different particulars have been offered. The discussions in Beirut got here because the warfare between Israel and Hamas, the Palestinian militant group that guidelines the Gaza Strip, is now in its third week. The preventing, triggered by Hamas’ deadly incursion into Israel on Oct. 7 that killed greater than 1,400 individuals in Israel, has killed greater than 5,700 Palestinians in Gaza.
Because the Gaza loss of life toll spirals, tensions have also been rising along the tense Lebanon-Israel border, the place Hezbollah members have been exchanging fireplace with Israeli troops for the reason that day after Hamas’ rampage into Israel.
For now, these exchanges stay restricted to a handful of border cities and Hezbollah and Israeli army positions on either side. Lebanese military troopers and United Nations peacekeeping forces have deployed in giant numbers.
Dozens of Hezbollah fighters have been killed within the clashes up to now, the group says, whereas the Israeli army has additionally introduced some deaths amongst its ranks.
Nasrallah has but to publicly converse concerning the warfare in Gaza and clashes alongside the Lebanon-Israel border. Nonetheless, different Hezbollah prime officers have warned Israel in opposition to its deliberate floor invasion into the besieged territory.
Israeli officers have stated they’d retaliate aggressively in case of a cross-border assault by Hezbollah from Lebanon.
“We are going to cripple it with a power it can’t even think about, and the results for it and the Lebanese state (will likely be) devastating,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stated whereas visiting Israeli troops alongside the border with Lebanon on Sunday.
Lebanon’s cash-strapped caretaker authorities, alongside regional and worldwide figures, has been scrambling to maintain the nation out of the warfare.
Hezbollah and Israel fought a monthlong warfare in 2006 that resulted in a tense stalemate. Israel sees Iran-backed Hezbollah as its most critical menace, estimating it has some 150,000 rockets and missiles geared toward Israel.
