Sheikh Qassem: Gaza΄s lesson assures the need to preserve Lebanon΄s strength, resistance, army and population

Source: nowlebanon.com, 20-01-2009

Hizbullah deputy secretary general Sheikh Naim Qassem said that Hizbullah supported Arab reconciliation. He said that such reconciliation affirmed that resistance was right and stopped attempts to exploit Arab divisions in "Israel's" interests.

In a ceremony to honor journalists on Tuesday, he said that Gaza achieved victory because it resisted and persevered. "Victory is not measured by the number of martyrs or injured, by destroying houses or by the launched rockets but by failing the ‘Israeli' objectives. So ‘Israel' lost because it did not achieve its goals," he said.

Qassem said that "Israel" was defeated from the outset because it did not dare to announce its objectives, fearing it might not attain them. "Israel" decided that if it achieves something it would say that it was the objective.

Qassem said that he asked those who said that a solution should be found to weapons smuggling into Gaza whether a solution should instead be found for the 1000 tonnes of artillery that entered "Israel" from Greece as well as the tons of bombs that were used by the "Israelis" on the Palestinians.

"We did not bring ‘Israel' into the region; it came to Palestine, attacked Lebanon, and is attacking other countries in the region. We have a new lesson today from Gaza which assures us of the need to preserve Lebanon's strength, resistance, army and population," he said.

He added that the defense strategy would discuss the details of this strength. However, he said, let it be known that we discuss the strategy of strong defense which determines the resistance's position and weapons. We will not discuss how to dump the weapons, he said.