Hezbollah leader gives fiery Gaza speech, but does not signal wider conflict

BEIRUT — Hezbollah secretary general Hassan Nasrallah gave a long-awaited, blustery speech today in which he expressed his support for Hamas, condemned Israel and the US in striking terms, but otherwise appeared to distance his organization — as well as Iran — from the Oct. 7 attack and did not announce a wider war with Israel.

“The great and blessed ‘Al-Aqsa Flood’ operation was 100 percent Palestinian in decision and 100 percent Palestinian implementation,” he said in what appeared to be live remarks but shown on a large screen before supporters in Lebanon. “It had nothing to do with any international or regional file, and its operators hid it from everyone, even from the resistance factions in Gaza, as well as the rest of the countries and movements of the axis of resistance. This guaranteed its absolute secrecy.

“This concealment did not bother anyone in the resistance axis,” he said, referring to other Iranian-back, anti-Israel groups in the region, “but rather we all praised it, and it does not have any negative impact on any decision taken by a team or resistance movement.”

The speech marked the first significant public statement by Nasrallah since Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack on Israel that killed more than 1,300 Israelis and sparked a ferocious counterattack by the Israeli military that has killed at least 5,000 in Gaza since. The question: What would Hezbollah, a more potent anti-Israeli armed group than Hamas, do?

The speech was perhaps most remarkable for what it lacked: a full-throated call for Hezbollah to go to full-scale war with Israel. Nasrallah suggested instead that at least for now, the deadly skirmishes between Israel and Hezbollah on Lebanon’s southern border would continue, but Hezbollah did not wish for a wider war. He did warn, however, that the “Lebanese front is opened on all possibilities.”

“The Islamic resistance in Lebanon is fighting a real battle that only those who are actually present in the border region can feel, a battle different from all its predecessors,” he said, adding that his fighters there are keeping some Israeli forces occupied who would otherwise be fighting in Gaza.

Elsewhere in the speech the Hezbollah chief emphasized that Iran was not in control of the regional armed groups it is accused of funding, specifically saying Tehran did not control militias in Syria and Iraq that have attacked US forces and interests in recent weeks.

It was, defense expert and retired Lebanese armed forces Gen. Wehbe Katicha told Breaking Defense, a “populist speech, but it removes responsibility from Iran and Hezbollah for igniting the spark of war.”

“He does not want escalation, and the skirmishes on [Lebanon’s] southern borders are strictly kept in a zone where Israel can bear them,” Katicha said.

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In his speech, Nasrallah claimed that Hezbollah is keeping Israel from making any moves on Lebanon — oddly echoing America’s own line that its forces are in the region to contain the conflict and deter others, like Hezbollah, from spreading it.

“The resistance operations in the south and the blood of our martyrs in the south say to this enemy that may you consider attacking Lebanon or carrying out a pre-emptive operation towards Lebanon, you will commit the greatest foolishness in your history and existence,” Nasrallah said.

Speaking directly to the US, he said, “Your fleets that you threaten us with, we have prepared for them as well.”

Whether Hezbollah is truly prepared for a confrontation with the US remains to be seen, and is perhaps less likely today than it was prior to the speech.