JERUSALEM, Oct 1: Following the withdrawal of its remaining troops out of Lebanon on Sunday, Israel warned that it would act decisively should Hezbollah try to rebuild its infrastructure destroyed during the 34-day war.
“If Hezbollah approaches the frontier with arms and tries to reconstruct its infrastructure that we have destroyed, we will use all the means at our disposal to prevent this,” chief of staff Dan Halutz told army radio.
Army radio said that Israel had beefed up its troops along the border with Lebanon.
A spokesman for the foreign affairs ministry, Mark Regev, told AFP that “no-one should expect Israel to honour the agreement unilaterally if the other party to the agreement fails in their commitment”.
“The pullout from Lebanon has been done in the framework of implementing UN Security Council Resolution 1701,” Mr Regev said.
“Just as Israel has moved to fulfil its commitment, it is the obligation of the Lebanese government and the UN forces to fully implement their commitment.”
“First and foremost we have to see the immediate release of the two Israeli servicemen being held hostage in Lebanon,” Mr Regev said, referring to two soldiers captured by Hezbollah in cross-border raids on July 12 that killed eight other troops and sparked the Jewish state’s offensive.
“We have to see the creation in south Lebanon of an area free of all armed Hezbollah personnel and we have to see the enforcement of the international arms embargo to prevent illicit arms transfers to Hezbollah,” he said.
Resolution 1701 put an end to 34 days of devastating conflict between Israel and Shia militants of Hezbollah and called for Israel’s withdrawal from Lebanon in tandem with the deployment of Lebanese government troops and additional UN peacekeepers, as well as the disarming of all militias.
National Infrastructure Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer predicted, meanwhile, that the Israeli army will return to Lebanon “in three or four months”.
“Hassan Nasrallah is preparing for a new war with the support of Syria,” he told army radio, referring to the chief of the Shia militant group.
He repeated his call of the previous day that Israel had to “eliminate (Nasrallah) as soon as an occasion presents itself”. “Those who expect the Lebanese army to assure security along the Israeli border are deluding themselves,” he said.—AFP
