Middle East reacts to Nasrallah's assassination
Middle East nations and Hezbollah's allies in the Tehran-aligned "Axis of Resistance" reacted on Saturday to the killing of Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah after the Lebanon-based group confirmed their leader's death in Israeli strikes.
Military officials in Israel announced on Saturday morning that Nasrallah, who headed Hezbollah for more than three decades, died in bombardment targeting the group's headquarters in the southern suburbs of Beirut Friday night.
Hezbollah officially confirmed the death hours later.
- Hezbollah -
Hezbollah confirmed in a statement that Nasrallah had been killed, saying he had "joined his great, immortal martyr comrades whom he led for about 30 years."
The group said he was killed with other members "following the treacherous Zionist strike on the southern suburbs" of Beirut.
- Israel -
The Israeli military described the Hezbollah chief as one of Israel's "greatest enemies of all time."
Military spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said, "His elimination makes the world a safer place," but Hagari added the group's remaining senior members would still be targeted.
Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said Nasrallah "deserved" to die.
"The elimination of arch-terrorist Nasrallah is one of the most justified counter-terrorism actions Israel has ever taken," Katz said in a post on social media platform X.
- Iran -
Iran, which arms and finances Hezbollah, said the direction Nasrallah set for the Lebanese group, which for nearly a year had engaged in cross-border fire with Israeli forces, would be maintained.
"The glorious path of the leader of the resistance, Hassan Nasrallah, will continue and his sacred goal will be realized in the liberation of Quds (Jerusalem), God willing," foreign ministry spokesman Nasser Kanani said
Iran's First Vice President Mohammad Reza Aref issued a warning to Israel's leaders "that the unjust bloodshed... especially of Hezbollah's secretary general, martyr Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, will bring about their destruction," Iran's ISNA news agency quoted Aref as saying.
- Hamas -
Palestinian militant group Hamas condemned Nasrallah's assassination "in the strongest terms" and criticized the strikes on southern Beirut as "barbaric Zionist aggression and targeting of residential buildings."
"We consider it a cowardly terrorist act," the group said in a statement that offered "condolences, and solidarity with the brothers in Hezbollah and the Islamic Resistance in Lebanon on the martyrdom of... Nasrallah."
The Hezbollah chief had said his fighters' rocket fire over the border into Israel was in "support" of Hamas.
- Yemen's Houthis -
Yemen's Houthi rebels said Nasrallah's killing would strengthen their determination to confront their Israeli foes.
"The martyrdom of... Hassan Nasrallah will increase the flame of sacrifice, the heat of enthusiasm, the strength of resolve," the rebels' leadership council said in a statement, vowing to achieve "victory and the demise of the Israeli enemy."
- Iraq -
Iraq's Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani condemned the slaying of the Hezbollah chief as a "crime that shows the Zionist entity has crossed all the red lines."
In a statement, he called the Israeli strikes on south Beirut a "shameful attack" and described Nasrallah as "a martyr on the path of the righteous."
Source: Agence France Presse
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