Hezbollah leader says has rockets despite Israeli efforts in Syria
BEIRUT (Reuters) - The leader of Lebanon’s Hezbollah said on Thursday that his group had obtained precision rockets despite Israeli strikes in recent years aimed at cutting the supply route through Syria.
Lebanon's Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah gestures as he addresses his supporters via a screen during last day of Ashura, in Beirut, Lebanon September 20, 2018. REUTERS/Aziz Taher
“No matter what you do to cut the route, the matter is over and the resistance possesses precision and non-precision rockets and weapons capabilities,” Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah said, addressing Israel in a broadcast speech.
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“If Israel imposes a war on Lebanon, Israel will face a fate and a reality it has never expected on any day,” he added.
Hezbollah, backed by Iran, has played a critical role in supporting Syrian President Bashar al-Assad during Syria’s seven-year-long civil war.
Israel regards Hezbollah as the biggest threat on its borders and has said that it has carried out repeated strikes in Syria to prevent it getting arms deliveries from Iran.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards helped form Hezbollah in the early 1980s to resist Israel’s occupation of southern Lebanon, which ended in 2000. Israel and Hezbollah fought a brief war on Lebanese soil in 2006.
Reporting By Angus McDowall and Laila Bassam; Editing by Toby Chopra, William Maclean
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