Israeli Air Force jets flew low over Beirut on Tuesday minutes before Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah was set to address a memorial marking one week since the death of his No. 2 man, Fuad Shukr.
Lebanese eyewitnesses told the Reuters wire agency that they were able to see the Israeli planes, which were said to have produced “one of the largest sonic booms heard by residents in years,” with the naked eye.
Shukr was a top terror commander responsible for a rocket barrage that killed 12 children in a Druze village in the Israeli Golan Heights, as well as a 1983 bombing that killed more than 300 U.S. and French service personnel in Beirut. He was killed in an Israeli airstrike in the Lebanese capital on July 30.
Speaking at the memorial ceremony for the slain terrorist by video link, Nasrallah confirmed that Iran, Hezbollah and Yemen’s Houthis would respond jointly to the killings of Shukr and top Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, who was assassinated on July 31 in Tehran by a planted bomb that has been associated with Israel.
“The enemy is waiting in a state of loss and anxiety,” charged the Hezbollah leader, adding that the waiting “is part of the punishment.”
“Iran is forced to fight after the assassination of martyr Haniyeh in Iran, but Iran is not required to fight indefinitely,” said Nasrallah, adding that Hezbollah requested Tehran’s “moral, political and military support.”
“Our response is coming, Inshallah [‘God willing’], alone or with the Axis of Resistance, regardless of the ramifications,” vowed Nasrallah.
“We once again call on the Arab and Islamic countries to reconsider their approach in light of the dangers that threaten the region,” he said, in reference to reported declarations by the governments of Jordan and Saudi Arabia that they would not allow Tehran to use their airspace.
Regarding the expected joint attack led by Tehran, Nasrallah claimed that American military assistance in the face of the mounting threats proves Jerusalem’s “incapability to defend itself, as was also shown in Iran’s Operation True Promise” missile and drone assault on April 13.
Haniyeh‘s death is “a great loss for [Iran’s] Axis of Resistance, but it will not deter the resistance” in the Gaza Strip, Judea and Samaria, he said.
“When it comes to the general situation of the current battle, Gaza and the West Bank are its central arena, in addition to the support fronts,” Nasrallah said of Hezbollah’s ongoing attacks in support of Hamas, which started on Oct. 8 following the massacre in southern Israel.
“Today in northern occupied Palestine—despite the Iron Dome, David’s Sling and air-defense systems, which are on high alert—the resistance drones reached Nahariya and Acre,” the top terrorist continued.
As Nasrallah spoke, air-raid sirens were activated in communities in Israel’s north, warning of renewed rocket and drone fire from Lebanon. According to local reports, a fire broke out near the town of Beit Hillel in the Galilee panhandle as a result of a rocket launched by Hezbollah.
At the same time, Israeli Air Force jets launched new strikes on Hezbollah terrorist infrastructure in Kfarkela in Southern Lebanon.
Earlier on Tuesday, 19 Israelis were wounded, including one critically, when Hezbollah launched suicide drones towards the Western Galilee.
Hezbollah has attacked the Jewish state nearly every day since Oct. 8, firing thousands of rockets, missiles and drones at Israel, killing more than 40 people and causing widespread damage. Tens of thousands of Israeli civilians remain internally displaced due to the ongoing violence.