It was the eighth time the Hizbullah chief has appeared on television since the start of the war. Nasrallah warned Israel, "If you bomb our capital Beirut, we will bomb the capital of your usurping entity...we will bomb Tel Aviv - which we are capable of doing."
The Kuwaiti daily Al-Rai al-Am quoted a Hizbullah official as saying that members of the organization's "missiles brigade" had already been given the orders to strike Tel Aviv the moment they receive word Beirut is under attack. Israel carried out numerous strikes on the southern Beirut neighborhood of Dahiyeh late Thursday night following Nasrallah's speech. Three people were killed in the attacks.
In his speech, Nasrallah offered to stop attacking northern Israel with rockets if Israel ceases its air strikes on Lebanon. "Any time you decide to stop your campaign against our cities, villages, civilians and infrastructure, we will stop firing rockets on Israeli settlements and cities in northern Palestine [sic].” Nasrallah refers to all Israeli communities as "settlements," including those within the pre-1967 borders as well as those built following the Six Day War.
Nasrallah insisted that Hizbullah fighters are inflicting large casualties upon the IDF and boasted that they would prefer to continue the ground battle and dispense with the air strikes on both sides.
He called Prime Minister Ehud Olmert a "fool" for declaring a victory prematurely. "He wants to look like [former prime ministers Ariel] Sharon, [Yitzhak] Rabin, and [Menachem] Begin. Ask him where the accomplishments are that he promised you," he said.
The Kuwaiti daily Al-Rai al-Am quoted a Hizbullah official as saying that members of the organization's "missiles brigade" had already been given the orders to strike Tel Aviv the moment they receive word Beirut is under attack. Israel carried out numerous strikes on the southern Beirut neighborhood of Dahiyeh late Thursday night following Nasrallah's speech. Three people were killed in the attacks.
In his speech, Nasrallah offered to stop attacking northern Israel with rockets if Israel ceases its air strikes on Lebanon. "Any time you decide to stop your campaign against our cities, villages, civilians and infrastructure, we will stop firing rockets on Israeli settlements and cities in northern Palestine [sic].” Nasrallah refers to all Israeli communities as "settlements," including those within the pre-1967 borders as well as those built following the Six Day War.
Nasrallah insisted that Hizbullah fighters are inflicting large casualties upon the IDF and boasted that they would prefer to continue the ground battle and dispense with the air strikes on both sides.
He called Prime Minister Ehud Olmert a "fool" for declaring a victory prematurely. "He wants to look like [former prime ministers Ariel] Sharon, [Yitzhak] Rabin, and [Menachem] Begin. Ask him where the accomplishments are that he promised you," he said.