Nasrallah: President Raeisi had great faith in Palestinian cause, resistance

The secretary-general of Lebanon’s Hezbollah resistance movement has said that Iran’s late President Ebrahim Raeisi was a political figure with “great faith” in the Palestinian cause and the region’s resistance front.

Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah made the remarks during a speech that he delivered in the Lebanese capital Beirut as a means of paying tribute to the president and his companions, who were martyred in a helicopter crash in northwestern Iran on Sunday.

Nasrallah also called Iran’s Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, who was also martyred in the incident, “a believer in the resistance and its movements.”

The Hezbollah leader described the tragic incident as “very painful and very sad in Iran and abroad.”

He noted that the martyrs’ funeral was attended by millions across the Islamic Republic. “The funeral processions is the third largest in the history of mankind after Imam Khomeini and Martyr Qassem Soleimani,” Nasrallah said, referring respectively to the late founder of the Islamic Republic and the former commander of the Quds Force of Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC).

The massive turnout, he observed, was a testament to the Iranian people’s “loyalty, allegiance, and firm commitment to the path of Imam Khomeini and to the leadership of the Islamic Republic of Iran.”

The tragedy has, however, neither "weakened" the country nor "shaken" it, the Hezbollah chief said, saying the country remains a key supporter of the Palestinian cause of liberation from Israeli occupation and aggression.

"This support is [even] increasing and is clearly visible," he stated.

On Israeli war on Gaza

Elsewhere in his remarks, Nasrallah pointed to the October-present war that the Israeli regime has been waging against the Gaza Strip following Al-Aqsa Storm, a retaliatory operation by Gaza’s resistance movements.

"The enemy acknowledges the severe suffering it faces and acknowledges its impotence and failure," he said.

The Hezbollah chief was apparently referring to Tel Aviv’s failure so far to realize the objectives that it has been seeking to achieve through the military onslaught, including destroying Gaza’s resistance groups and enabling the release of those who were taken captive during Al-Aqsa Storm.

"Today, as we are in the eighth month of the war on Gaza, the Israelis themselves, in power and the opposition, all agree that what the entity has experienced this year is unprecedented," Nasrallah said.

He noted the International Criminal Court (ICC) Prosecutor Karim Khan’s recent application for arrest warrants against Israeli war criminals, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, over their atrocities in Gaza.

"Who would have believed that the time would come when the International Criminal Court would request the issuance of arrest warrants against Zionist officials, and this is one of the results of the Al-Aqsa Storm," the Hezbollah leader said.

He also asserted that if the Israeli regime kept up the war "it will go to the abyss," warning that the regional resistance groups had "surprises" in store for the regime.

"You must expect surprises from our resistance," Nasrallah said, addressing Netanyahu.

The Hezbollah leader, meanwhile, hailed the European trio of Spain, Ireland, and Norway’s recent recognition of the Palestinian state.

"The recognition of the Palestinian state by a number of European countries represents a great loss for the occupation," he said.

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