Thousands of Hezbollah supporters shouted “death to Israel” as they thronged the coffin of a high-profile Lebanese militant who the group says was killed by an Israeli airstrike near the Syrian capital.
The group’s leader pledged to strike back at the Jewish state on Monday, but refrained from making any fiery threats during a speech addressing the assassination.
Hezbollah said Samir Qantar, who spent 30 years in an Israeli prison after being convicted of the 1979 murders of an Israeli policeman along with a father and his four-year-old daughter, was killed on Saturday along with eight others in the airstrike on a residential building in Jaramana.
Hezbollah officials pledged to avenge his killing, sparking fears of escalation in an already volatile region. The Hezbollah leader, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, said in a televised speech on Monday evening that the group would exact revenge but did not make any specific threats.
“It is our right to retaliate for [Qantar’s] assassination in the place, time and manner we deem appropriate. It is our right, and I will add tonight, that we in Hezbollah will practice this right with the help of God,” he said.
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