Lebanon

The full text of the press conference held by Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah on Monday August 9th, 2010 at Shahed Hall – Airport Highway In the Name of Allah, The Compassionate, The Most Merciful. Praise be to Allah, The Lord of the world. Peace be on the Seal of prophets - our Master and Prophet Abi Al Qassem Mohammad - and on his chaste and pure Household, chosen companions and all prophets and messengers. Brothers and sisters! Ladies and gentlemen! Peace be upon you all and Allah's mercy and blessing. First, I have promised to hold a press conference in which I present indications and data that open new horizons which help in accusing the Israeli enemy of assassinating martyr Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri. This is exactly what I promised of, and I will fulfill my promise tonight Inshallah. Also since I made my announcement to this effect, comments from one party were issued: Why now? Why not years before? Why did you hide this data? Why are you unveiling it now and talking about it? Apart from the means, background and technique in which this issue was evoked – as we will talk seriously because we do not want to get engaged with each other – I will leave answering this question to the end of the press conference because the data which I will present will help, taking its nature and timing into consideration. That will help very much in answering this question. Indeed I must welcome all of you and thank you for this important and great attendance. It goes without saying that the event, the topic, the cause, the stage and the challenge necessitated on you this level of responsibility – and you are competent for this responsibility. Welcome then. I also thank all the media outlets that will show interest in what I will say and broadcast it live on air. As usual, there are several topics: I will try to be as quick as possible. I will talk also in classical Arabic to generalize the benefit abroad. I will be as quick as possible to make full use of time though the case deserves considerable time from all of us. The first topic: Israel's accusation of Hezbollah. This is an indispensable prelude. The Israeli enemy had been working on this since the very beginning and especially after the event of September 13th, 1993. All of us – all the Lebanese – know that on that very day Oslo Accord was inked. Hezbollah organized a protest in the southern suburb (Dahiyeh); it was opposed by the Lebanese government which was then under Premier Hariri. Fire was opened on the demonstrators; ten martyrs fell and more than 50 were wounded. At the time, a kind of political tension and conflict took place between Hezbollah and the first government of Premier Hariri and with Premier Rafiq Hariri in person. This is well known. The Israelis intruded through one of their agent at the time who contacted one of the security internals in the party of Premier Hariri. He worked at convincing him that Hezbollah is plotting to assassinate him and is now in the execution stage. He particularly accused brethren martyr Imad Mughniyeh and others of what he claimed and the data he gave. To comprehend the issue, I would like to present it in my way: Months after the event of September 13th, 1993, Syrian Intelligence and pursuant to a command by General Ghazi Kanaan, arrested one of the Islamic Resistance cadres in Sidon – namely brethren fighter Hajj Ali Deeb who is known as Abu Hassan Salameh and who was later killed by the Israelis. When you listen to the collaborator talking about Abu Hassan Salameh, he would be meaning brethren Ali Deeb. Brethren Ali Deeb was arrested in ambiguous unknown conditions. Days later, I knew that brethren Abu Hassan Salameh is in Anjjar. So I went to meet General Ghazi Kanaan, and I called on him to set free the brethren. He told me that he sent him that morning to Damascus and that the issue is in Damascus by now. I blamed him saying: What is the story? Has you summoned him from me for interrogation, you know that we would have responded. You know we respond in such issues especially if the case is sensitive. General Ghazi told me: (Indeed let no one say I am referring to deceased persons because the document exists and will be presented in a while) Some days ago, Premier Rafiq Hariri paid me a visit and told me: I have some data; there is a very close person to Hajj Imad Mughniyeh. He is either a politburo or one of the very close bodyguards to Hajj Imad. He attended a session (this reminds me of Zuheir Essedeeq) with Hajj Imad Mughniyeh and Abu Hassan Salameh among others whom he did not know by name. In the session, they plotted to assassinate you. The assassination will take place through ambushes which will be set for you in this road and on that road. He gave him some details. General Ghazi carries on saying: We can't remain silent on that because this is an assassination operation which is being set for the Premier. We can't contact Imad Mughniyeh but we ca

• published: 03 Jul 2011
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