Hezbollah's Secretary-General Sayyed Hassan Nassrallah announced that "the killing of Sheikh Saleh al-Arouri and his brothers in the southern Dahyeh will definitely not go unanswered, and the decision is in the hands of the battlefield," indicating that "if we remain silent about the killing of al-Arouri, Lebanon will be exposed and the response is inevitable."
In a speech delivered during the memorial ceremony for leader Abu Salim al-Haj Mohammed Yaghi, Nassrallah emphasized that "the battle taking place in southern Lebanon has established the balance of deterrence," noting that "we are facing a real opportunity to liberate every inch of our Lebanese land and prevent the enemy from violating our borders and airspace."
He reminded that "from the beginning, we stated that the goal of the front in the south is to pressure the enemy's government to stop its aggression on Gaza and ease the burden on the resistance there."
He said, "The solution for the settlers in the north is to turn to their government and demand it stop the aggression on Gaza."
He revealed that the "Islamic Resistance has carried out more than 670 operations in three months and targeted 48 border sites multiple times." He pointed out that "over more than 100 kilometers and over 90 days, all enemy border sites and a large number of rear sites and settlements have been targeted in response to assaults on civilians." He added, "No border site has remained untargeted several times, and the technical and intelligence installations in all enemy sites have been targeted. These attacks by the resistance are worth hundreds of millions of dollars."
In the second phase, the enemy's soldiers fled to the empty settlements and to the surroundings of the sites out of fear of the resistance factions and their attacks on some locations.
Addressing those who question the wisdom of the confrontation in the south, he stated: "If you knew the scale of enemy casualties and their equipment, you would not have allowed yourselves to discuss the usefulness of fighting on the northern front."
He reiterated that "the goal of the front from Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and Yemen is to pressure the enemy's government, exhaust it, and inflict pain on it to stop the aggression on Gaza, and the second goal of the Lebanese southern front is to relieve pressure on the field situation in Gaza."
He said: "When the enemy was forced to withdraw divisions during the holidays, they brought divisions from Gaza, not from the northern front."
