Nasrallah says Israel to 'pay in blood' for killing of Lebanese women and children

Hezbollah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah on Friday vowed that Israel will “pay in blood” for the killing of civilians in south Lebanon, as he responded to Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant’s threats to strike deep in Lebanon.

“The enemy will pay in blood for the killing of our women and children in Nabatiyeh, Sawwaneh and elsewhere,” Nasrallah said in a televised speech marking Hezbollah’s ‘Martyr Leaders Day’.

“I will leave the matter to the battlefield,” he added.

Hezbollah and Israel have been exchanging near-daily fire across the border since the Israel-Hamas war broke out on October 7. Wednesday was the bloodiest day in more than four months of cross-border exchanges, with 10 civilians and five Hezbollah members including a commander killed.

Hezbollah said it retaliated on Thursday by firing dozens of rockets into the settlement of Kiryat Shmona in northern Israel and Nasrallah reiterated on Friday that it was only an “initial response.”

Describing the Nabatiyeh and Sawwaneh strikes as "deliberate massacres," Nasrallah said Israel’s killing of civilians has “a special sensitivity” to Hezbollah.

“The enemy is killing our leaders, jihadists and families and it is destroying our homes, but this will not push us to retreat or give up our responsibilities,” he stressed.

“The enemy must know that it went too far by its targeting of civilians,” Nasrallah warned.

Responding to threats voiced Thursday by Israel’s defense minister, Nasrallah described Gallant as a “lunatic” and warned that Hezbollah “possesses a massive and precise missile power that enables it to strike from Kiryat Shmona all the way to Eilat” in Israel's far south.

Gallant warned Thursday that Israel "can attack not only at 20 kilometers (from the border), but also at 50 kilometers, and in Beirut and anywhere else."

“Some are talking about the cost of resistance and its consequences in Lebanon, and these people are calling on us to surrender. The truth is that we are before two choices -- resistance or surrender -- and the price of surrender is hefty, dangerous and very critical,” Nasrallah added.

The cross-border exchanges have killed at least 268 people on the Lebanese side, most of them Hezbollah fighters but also 40 civilians, according to an AFP tally.

On the Israeli side, 10 soldiers and six civilians have been killed, according to the Israeli army.

The fighting has also displaced tens of thousands of residents on both sides of the border and Israel has repeatedly warned that it might use force against Hezbollah to secure its residents' return amid ongoing indirect negotiations over a political solution.