Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah on Saturday claimed that Israel is deterred by Lebanon and also said that the Second Lebanon War caused the IDF to be undermined.
He made the comments at a speech marking the 10th anniversary of the Second Lebanon War which he gave from his bunker and was broadcast on giant screens in the town of Bint J'beil.
“The Israeli military establishment has been undermined, and there is a lack of trust between the different ranks – something which continues to this day” as a result of the war, Nasrallah said in comments quoted by the Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper.
“(The war) also undermined the trust which the Israeli public has in the military, and undermined the Israeli public's belief that the IDF can win wars,” he claimed
"In light of all of these results," Nasrallah continued, "it is possible to surmise that Israel was hurt in the last war in terms of its spirit, trust, and will. It also lost confidence in its very existence."
The Hezbollah leader then went on to claim that the quiet on the Israel-Lebanon border is not because of agreements between Israel and the UN or the Lebanese government, but because "Israel is deterred by this country.”
“(Israel) knows that the resistance (Hezbollah) has grown in terms of weapons, strength, faith, and determination. Israelis today are afraid of the possibility of an invasion of the Galilee after OUR villages lived in fear," said Nasrallah, according to Yedioth Ahronoth.
He played down Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's statements, whereby the prime minister said that anyone who thinks that Israel is weak like a cobweb will receive an iron fist.
"We saw your 'iron fist' in Bint J'beil in 2006. I say this to Netanyahu – you are a society which is weaker than a cobweb, and are fed up with fighting and self defense," said Nasrallah.
Since the Second Lebanon War, Nasrallah has mostly been hiding in his bunker and has rarely been seen in public. He does, however, give the occasional speech or television interview in which he usually verbally attacks and threatens Israel.
In one of those interviews several months ago, Nasrallah threatened to targetcivilian sites across Israel and to invade the northern Galilee region.
He previously suggested that the organization would strike Israel’s chemical plants in Haifa, referring to the ammonia storage tanks there as “Hezbollah’s nuclear bomb”.