Regional security at stake: Hajj Hassan on the interconnected challenges

Hussein Hajj Hassan, the head of the Baalbek-Hermel Bloc, expressed the view that "Lebanon would be greatly affected if the enemy achieved its goals in Gaza. Therefore, Lebanon's national interest requires us to support the resistance in Gaza until it can defeat the enemy."

During a political meeting organized by the public relations of Hezbollah, he pointed out that "106 days have passed since the strategic Al-Aqsa Flood Operation began, digging deep into the memory and future of the Zionists, devoid of conscience and humanity."

He said: "After 15 weeks, Israel, according to the admissions of the Zionists and Americans, failed to achieve the goals declared in the early days, which were crushing the resistance, occupying the Gaza Strip, liberating prisoners, and displacing Palestinians."

He continued: "There is an unprecedented tension and divisions in the Zionist War Council. We face a confused and fearful enemy, and the Zionist War Council leading the war is deeply divided among its members, indicating defeat. They are well aware that they are far from achieving their goals, and they are confused about political, military, and security options, so they resort to killing.

In addition, Hajj Hassan stated, "There is an Israeli failure to achieve field results in Gaza, evidenced by resistance operations and rocket firing in northern Gaza, and contradictory Israeli statements about the length of the tunnels, which in their statements reached more than 700 km. They talk about the size of the tunnels and the strength of the resistance to justify their failure."

He added: "There is an Israeli failure in achieving field results in Gaza. The indicators of the enemy's defeat are accumulating in Gaza, as they killed prisoners but could not retrieve a single live captive, and they occupied parts of Gaza but could not control them. The resistance still holds and controls the field."

Moreover, he noted that "the image that most of the Western world, some Arab and Islamic world, tried to present about Israel as democratic and humane has been crushed. Today, Israel is a model of terrorism. A poll in the United States indicated that 51 percent of American youth talked about the disappearance of Israel to resolve the conflict, a qualitative shift."

Hajj Hassan emphasized, "If the enemy could achieve its goals in Gaza, a new transfer would have occurred in Gaza and the West Bank. Anyone thinking rationally knows that there is something called regional security, meaning security in Lebanon, Jordan, Syria, Palestine, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, and the rest of the region, which is interconnected.

"Any transfer operation will shake the security in the region, including Lebanon's security. If the enemy achieves its goals, who guarantees that it will not move to other countries in the region? Whereas, if the resistance and the Palestinian people in Gaza triumph, this becomes impossible," he said.

Furthermore, he believed, "When we fight in support of Gaza, we are supporting Lebanon and the Lebanese national interest, and we fortify national and Lebanese security."