Hezbollah acting leader vows to fight Israel

Hezbollah’s new acting leader on Monday pledged to keep fighting Israel and said the Lebanese militant group was ready for any ground invasion after its leader Hassan Nasrallah was killed in an airstrike last week.

In his first public speech since many of Hezbollah’s senior leaders were killed in the attack in Beirut Friday, the group’s deputy leader Naim Qassem said he knows “that the battle may be long,” but Israel will not achieve its goals.

“We will face any possibility, and we are ready if the Israelis decide to enter by land and the resistance forces are ready for a ground engagement,” he said in a televised address. 

“What we are doing is the bare minimum. … We know that the battle may be long,” he added. 

In the past 10 days, Israeli strikes have killed Nasrallah and six of top commanders and officials across Lebanon. The barrage, which has significantly raised tensions in the region, has killed more than 1,000 people, nearly a quarter of them women and children, according to the Lebanon’s Health Ministry.

The strikes have included targets in central Beirut, the first time Israel has struck in that area in nearly a year, a signal that no area in the country is off limits to hit. 

And U.S. officials now believe that Israel could imminently launch a limited ground incursion into southern Lebanon near the border with Israel.  

But Qassem said that should Israel launch a ground offensive, Hezbollah is prepared. 

“Israel was not able to affect our [military] capabilities,” Qassem said. “There are deputy commanders and there are replacements in case a commander is wounded in any post.”

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, meanwhile, vowed that Israel would “use all the capabilities we have,” hinting at a ground operation as he met with Israeli troops Monday, according to The Associated Press.

Hezbollah has been firing missiles and drones into northern Israel following Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack from Gaza. The event started intense Israeli airstrikes and ground invasion in the Palestinian territory, with Hezbollah pledging continued attacks until a cease-fire in Gaza was announced. Both Hezbollah and Hamas are backed by Iran.

Israel has promised to keep up the retaliatory airstrikes until the attacks stop and its citizens can return to their homes near the border. It has also been blamed for a mid-September attack of pagers and walkie-talkies used by Hezbollah, killing dozens of people and wounded thousands, including civilians.