FSA Chief of Staff Warns Nasrallah: We Know How to Get to You
General Selim Idriss, chief of staff of the rebel Free Syrian Army, on Thursday launched a scathing attack on Hizbullah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, describing him as a “criminal” and “leader of Shabiha.”
"The killer does not belong to a religion, sect or nationality, and any killer will be killed eventually," Idriss said, according to a statement issued by the Joint Command of the Free Syrian Army.
"We know how to get to you and your era has practically ended," Idriss added, addressing Nasrallah.
He vowed that "anyone who dares to attack our people and our land will pay a hefty price.”
Addressing “our brothers, the great Lebanese people,” Idriss called on them to “regain their state that has been taken over by the terrorist Hizbullah gang.”
“It is time for Lebanon's spring to begin and for Lebanon to regain its normal position, sovereignty and prosperity,” Idriss added.
Three Lebanese Shiites have been killed in fighting in Syria, a Hizbullah official said Sunday, as the Syrian opposition accused the Lebanese group of intervening on the side of the regime.
He said they were acting in "self-defense,” without specifying if they were Hizbullah members.
Just hours earlier, the main bloc of the Syrian opposition accused the Damascus ally of having intervened "militarily" on the side of the regime, and warned this posed a threat to ties between neighbors Syria and Lebanon.
Hizbullah has systematically denied sending fighters into Syria, though its leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah acknowledged in October 2012 that party members had fought Syrian rebels but said they were acting as individuals and not under the group's direction.
Nasrallah clarified that the Hizbullah fighters were killed while defending Lebanese-inhabited border towns inside Syria. He explained that there are 23 Syrian border towns and 12 farms that are inhabited by Lebanese residents of various religious beliefs, adding that around 30,000 Lebanese residents live in these towns.
“The residents of these towns took the decision to stay and defend themselves against the armed groups and did not engage in the battle between the regime and the opposition,” Hizbullah's leader added.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the three slain Lebanese were members of pro-regime militias who had been trained by Hizbullah.
Louay al-Meqdad, spokesman for the Supreme Council of the Free Syrian Army, has accused Hizbullah of shelling Syrian territory with artillery and rocket launchers from bases inside Lebanon.
On Wednesday, General Idriss threatened to shell positions of Hizbullah in Lebanon after accusing it of firing across the border into territory it controls.
"In the past week... Hizbullah has been shelling into villages around Qusayr from Lebanese territory, and that we cannot accept," Idriss told Agence France Presse on the phone, adding that the rebels had given Hizbullah a 48-hour deadline to stop the attacks.
Conflicting reports emerged on Thursday that the Free Syrian Army had shelled Hizbullah positions in Lebanon and Syria.
The FSA said that the attacks targeted a Hizbullah artillery position in Lebanon's Hermel region in the Bekaa, reported al-Arabiya.
Head of the FSA's Farouq brigades Taleb al-Dayekh announced that it launched “mortar attacks against a number of Hizbullah locations in Lebanon's Hosh al-Sayyed Ali region,” reported Voice of Lebanon radio (100.5).
The rebel FSA later said that it shelled a Hizbullah position in the western Reef Qusayr area near the Lebanese-Syrian border.
FSA sources later denied to Sky News that it had targeted Hizbullah positions in and outside of Syria.
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