{"id":458191,"date":"2026-05-24T21:37:09","date_gmt":"2026-05-24T21:37:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/458191\/"},"modified":"2026-05-24T21:37:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-24T21:37:09","slug":"hezbollah-chief-rejects-disarmament-says-weapons-will-remain","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/458191\/","title":{"rendered":"Hezbollah chief rejects disarmament, says weapons will remain"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.jpost.com\/middle-east\/article-896469\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Hezbollah<\/a> Secretary-General <a href=\"https:\/\/www.jpost.com\/middle-east\/article-897129\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Naim Qassem<\/a> denounced the concept of the terror group disarming during his speech on &#8220;Resistance and Liberation Day,&#8221; which commemorates the IDF&#8217;s withdrawal from occupying southern Lebanon on May 25, 2000.<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">&#8220;There is no such thing as exclusivity of weapons or disarming Hezbollah,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">Further, he argued that Hezbollah&#8217;s disarmament would remove Lebanon&#8217;s &#8220;defensive capability, and the capability of the resistance and its people, as a prelude to extermination.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">&#8220;Disarmament is extermination, and this is something we cannot accept,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">He also said that Israel&#8217;s withdrawal was the &#8220;first liberation that took place in the Arab region without an agreement with the Israeli entity.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><img alt=\"Hezbollah Secretary-General Naim Qassem gives a televised speech from an unknown location in this still image obtained from a video released December 5, 2025; illustrative.\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"822\" height=\"829\" decoding=\"async\" data-nimg=\"1\" style=\"color:transparent\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1779658629_214_699484.jpeg\"\/>Hezbollah Secretary-General Naim Qassem gives a televised speech from an unknown location in this still image obtained from a video released December 5, 2025; illustrative. (credit: Al Manar TV\/REUTERS TV\/via REUTERS )<\/p>\n<p>He also praised Hezbollah&#8217;s first-person view (FPV) <a href=\"https:\/\/www.jpost.com\/defense-and-tech\/article-897097\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">drones<\/a>, which he said made Israel &#8220;dizzy,&#8221; while listing several attacks on IDF soldiers. In his list, he claimed that the attacks killed several named officers, while the IDF said they were injured.<\/p>\n<p>US not an honest actor due to Israel ties, Hezbollah chief says<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">Qassem also denounced the US, stating that it is not a mediator, nor an honest actor, as it &#8220;manages Israel according to its interests.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">During the anti-US portion of his address, he criticized Washington&#8217;s sanctions on Hezbollah MPs, the Iranian ambassador in Lebanon (who Beirut declared persona non grata), and other Shi&#8217;ite officials.<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">He laid out four premises which, in his view, must be in place before Hezbollah and Lebanon can proceed.<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">Firstly, that Israel is &#8220;an expansionist enemy that wants all of Lebanon and the region.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">Secondly, all Lebanese factions must unite to confront Israel&#8217;s &#8220;aggression.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">Thirdly, all Lebanese factions should prevent strife and work towards stability.<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">Fourth, stop Israeli &#8220;aggression,&#8221; achieve a complete Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon, deploy the Lebanese military south of the Litani River, return Hezbollah &#8220;prisoners,&#8221; and &#8220;reconstruction&#8221; of infrastructure.<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">&#8220;If the government is incapable of securing sovereignty, it should leave,&#8221; he argued.<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">Qassem also rejected direct negotiations between Beirut and Jerusalem. &#8220;I advise you &#8211; leave direct negotiations and act coy towards the US. Tell them &#8211; stop asking us for anything, then they will run to you and beg you to come.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">Qassem also discussed the sanctions placed on the Hezbollah-run financial institution al-Qard al-Hassan. He stated that it has no relation to &#8220;banking or economic work,&#8221; and that it is merely an institution that &#8220;gives loans to those in need.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">He also said that Hezbollah has &#8220;no relation&#8221; to the institution.<\/p>\n<p>Palestine to remain Hezbollah&#8217;s &#8216;compass,&#8217; Qassem says<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">Further, he explained that &#8220;Palestine will remain the compass&#8221; for Hezbollah&#8217;s policies. &#8220;We will remain supportive and backing,&#8221; he added.<\/p>\n<p>He also denounced the assassination of Hamas military wing chief Izz ad-Din al-Haddad, and the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.jpost.com\/middle-east\/article-897172\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Global Sumud Flotilla&#8217;s<\/a> seizure by the Israel Navy.<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">Discussing the strikes on Iran as part of operations Roaring Lion and Epic Fury, he said, &#8220;They attack. The aggression is clear before the whole world.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">&#8220;The Islamic Republic will succeed in defending itself from this aggression,&#8221; he added.<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">Qassem also denounced the Kingdom of Bahrain and its arrest of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-linked activists. &#8220;What is the King of Bahrain doing? 41 scholars and opinion leaders are thrown into prisons because they have a cultural and intellectual direction, they have a political direction, and an opinion,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">&#8220;Bahrain must return to its senses and release the detainees, because injustice does not continue and does not settle,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p>Rubio condemns Hezbollah for call to overthrow Lebanese government<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">US Secretary of State Marco Rubio condemned the Hezbollah terrorist group after it called for the overthrow of the Lebanese government on Sunday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">&#8220;Hezbollah has ignored repeated calls from the legitimate Government of Lebanon to cease its attacks and respect a ceasefire,&#8221; Rubio stated. &#8220;Instead, it has continued firing on Israeli positions and moving fighters and weapons into southern Lebanon.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">Rubio further accused Hezbollah of &#8220;actively trying to drag Lebanon back into chaos and destruction.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">The US stands behind the Lebanese government, he promised.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Hezbollah Secretary-General Naim Qassem denounced the concept of the terror group disarming during his speech on &#8220;Resistance and&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":425872,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[18292,16606,8319,51,42,86,25601,1031,53065,21453,20426,71283,43,157282,157283,48,4321,98,2896,40,38,41,39,730],"class_list":["post-458191","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-bahrain","tag-drone","tag-global-sumud-flotilla","tag-hamas","tag-headlines","tag-hezbollah","tag-hezbollah-disarmament","tag-idf","tag-irgc","tag-islamic-revolutionary-guard-corps","tag-litani-river","tag-naim-qassem","tag-news","tag-operation-epic-fury","tag-operation-roaring-lion","tag-palestine","tag-sanctions","tag-terrorism","tag-terrorist","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-washington"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/458191","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=458191"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/458191\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/425872"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=458191"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=458191"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=458191"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}