Al Mayadeen's interview with Hezbollah Secretary-General Sheikh Naim Qassem
On Tuesday 8th July 2025 Al Mayadeen published an article summarizing its first interview with Hezbollah Secretary-General Sheikh Naim Qassem since he assumed the leadership of the Lebanese movement, revealing details of the war against Israel. The article in the link above includes video snippets (in Arabic, but with English subtitles): it is an interesting, but long read. So, here are some highlights with direct quotations from Sheikh Naim Qassem himself (all emphasis mine):
This kind of decision [to start a military operation (not a full war) against Israel in support of Gaza, following Hamas’s al-Aqsa Flood Operation] cannot be made via phone calls or casual communications. It required an urgent in-person meeting.
The outcome of a full war is predictable. It requires preparedness that simply wasn’t available.
We had to enter the battle with limited support and observe developments closely. Based on how things evolved, we could make a clearer choice.
We aimed to draw a significant number of Israeli forces to northern occupied Palestine.
The more soldiers we kill, the more we push Israel closer to defeat.
It also sends a clear message to the Israelis that they are facing a two-front war, and that it is in their interest to find a solution and bring this to an end.
We simply didn’t know [about al-Aqsa Flood Operation]. If we weren’t aware, how could we join a comprehensive war from the start?
In fact, even parts of Hamas’ leadership abroad weren’t aware.
Whether they told us or not, our stance remains firm in supporting Palestine, especially during this strategic phase of the al-Aqsa Flood.
For two months, we assessed whether this level of support was enough. But we came to see that the Israeli aggression was extreme, supported by new rules of engagement and US backing. Doing more than support would not have changed the outcome.
We did not know the supply chain [of the rigged pagers] had been exposed. With the means available to us, we could not detect the presence of explosives. This could be seen as a failure, or as a limitation of our capabilities.
There were efforts to examine the pager differently, including attempts to break it open, which were prompted by some anomalies that raised questions.
[Regarding Israeli surveillance of Hezbollah through aerial and electronic means, including possible wiretapping] We did not realize the extent, that it was near-total and very extensive.
We didn’t have the capacity to grasp how deep Israel’s information gathering had gone.
Frankly speaking, the human breach appears very limited compared to the immense volume of data collected through surveillance and drones.
There is no indication of any significant breach involving core figures or senior commanders. If we find there has been human penetration, I will speak publicly and disclose the level of that breach.
A people like this, an Ummah like this, a party and resistance like this, cannot be defeated. Do you expect anything less than for us to remain present, strong, and capable of shaping the future we choose?
They failed to spark internal strife. They failed to destroy the party. They failed to achieve their objectives.
Resistance will not wait forever. There are limits. There is no third option between victory and martyrdom. We do not have surrender as an option.
Their strategy is: “Let’s use diplomacy to get what we couldn’t in war”. So the Americans apply pressure through Israel.
I salute President Joseph Aoun, Speaker Nabih Berri, and all officials involved in what has become a remarkable display of national unity. [In my opinion, this speaks volume: saluting the US puppet Joseph Aoun].
[Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah’s] martyrdom was not only unexpected to the world, it was unexpected for us.
If you had asked me before, I would have said all of us might fall before Sayyed [Nasrallah] does. That’s how strong, courageous, and divinely guided he was.
It was not easy to imagine his departure. Perhaps this was part of a divine secret. We do not know when our time comes. But he earned his rest, and he rose to the highest rank. We consider martyrdom the greatest honor, and he received the highest honor.
It was not easy to imagine his departure. Perhaps this was part of a divine secret. We do not know when our time comes. But he earned his rest, and he rose to the highest rank. We consider martyrdom the greatest honor, and he received the highest honor.
At first, I was in denial. I thought maybe the news wasn’t true, maybe he wasn’t hit, maybe he was still alive somewhere. But the next day, the brothers confirmed the body had been recovered. That’s when the truth settled in.
We don’t cry because he’s gone, we cry because we don’t know how to compensate for what we’ve lost. But martyrdom doesn’t stop the path; it nourishes it.
We are now charged with continuing this mission at the level of his sacrifice. With sincerity and resolve, we ask God to help us carry this responsibility.
Now that I was in this position [as Hezbollah Secretary-General], I had to intensify communication with relevant commanders and better understand operational details.
[Regarding Hezbollah’s military decision-making process] There is no appointment without deep discussion.
We might say: this is our proposal, the Jihadi Council recommends this course. Should we strike this way? Launch a drone? Fire a rocket? All of this goes through internal deliberation.
Hezbollah was run as if it still had a secretary general [at the time between Nasrallah’s death and Qassem’s election]. No one outside the leadership was making the decisions.
When Tel Aviv was struck, that had its own directive. When the strike hit Netanyahu’s residence, that required a specific order. Even what the enemy calls “Black Sunday” on 24th November [2025], 370 rockets and drones in one day, that too was based on a formal decision.
The Secretary-General [Nasrallah] was following developments closely through the military command.
Every position in the military command was occupied. No seat was left vacant.
While we appreciate the Iranian advice, the decisions related to our military structure were made internally.
[Regarding battlefield performance and “legendary resilience”, attributed to 2 main components] First, the young fighters who were stationed there: they knew what they were doing and held their ground even if they were cut off from communication. They achieved something heroic.
The second component was the external support, what we call the bombardment. Until the very last moment, fighters were reaching positions like the southern town of Khiam. There were places we couldn’t reach, yes, but not everything was severed.
Hezbollah is rebuilding, recovering, and ready now. If Israel were to attack, we would not stand by and watch; we would fight. [This is quite a curious statement, considering that Israel keeps violating the so-called “ceasefire” without any response by Hezbollah].
[Regarding claims that 500 of Hezbollah’s weapons storage sites south of the Litani River had been destroyed] They’re referring to what they saw south of the Litani. But the country is vast.
As media coverage and diplomatic discussions unfolded, [on 25th September 2024] Sayyed Nasrallah [killed two days later] informed Speaker Nabih Berri through (Hezbollah MP) Hussein Khalil that Hezbollah was open to the idea of a ceasefire, depending on how the proposal could be improved through negotiations.
If the enemy stops, we are ready to stop. We didn’t start the war; they did.
At that point, the battle risked becoming aimless, and we would have ended up at the negotiating table anyway. So, on 24th November [2024], we agreed to a ceasefire because the enemy had also accepted it.
[Hezbollah’s front-line commander] said this was the right proposal at the right time, after we had reached the point of attrition.
How could a ceasefire go into effect at 4 o’clock, and everyone from the frontlines to the rear immediately comply, unless there’s a connected command chain and a decision being executed?
Iran never asked us to agree to a ceasefire. We informed them of our decision, but it was entirely ours. It was a Lebanese decision, taken by Hezbollah and Amal. Even the Lebanese state accepted the agreement through indirect negotiations.
Iran understood that direct entry into the war would pull the United States into a confrontation with Tehran, giving Israel exactly what it wanted, a larger war with US backing.
Iran did everything it could and more. We never asked Iran to participate in the war, and it did not need to be asked. Its support is the foundation of our resilience, and that of the entire resistance.
Participation comes in many forms. Iran did what mattered most, and it was deeply effective.
The [Iranian Supreme] Leader was receiving daily reports from the IRGC, Iranian intelligence, and media, and was actively following developments. He urged his officials to give support, stay engaged, and stand by us.
What more could we ask for? The stream kept on flowing even if some of the canals got damaged. But if the source dries up, we have a real problem. And the source, Imam Khamenei’s commitment, remains steadfast.
What happened in Syria [in early December 2024, with Bashar al-Assad’s fall] was certainly a loss for the Axis of Resistance because Syria was a route for military support.
We still cannot clearly read what the shape of the future Syrian system will be.
Thousands of Alawites and others were killed by groups connected to the regime. This poses a serious threat to any efforts at rebuilding a stable national framework.
Such steps [of Syrian normalization with Israel] are extremely dangerous.
Our trust in the Syrian people is high. We believe they will reject normalization, but how they do that is their responsibility, not ours.
We have always opposed normalization. Israel will not stop its aggression just because someone shakes hands with it. That’s an illusion.
[Israel has] taken 600 square kilometers of Syrian territory and stripped the Syrian army of much of its military capacity, yet its demands and attacks never cease.
Israel is a predatory entity. It’s expansionist, insatiable, and criminal. It has no problem committing acts of mass killing. It is a rampaging beast backed by the greatest tyrant, the United States.
We will not intervene on the ground to try to change the direction of the Syrian regime. We have no relation to that. We are against normalization in theory.
Even those who now call themselves “the Resistance” or “the People of Valor” [Syrian groups claiming the mantle of resistance], maybe they liked the name or someone suggested it, but we have no connection to them. We have no organized resistance project inside Syria.
We are not involved on the borders, that’s the army’s responsibility. We’re also not involved in the coastal events in Syria, nor in determining the nature of Syria’s regime or whether a resistance exists there.
The responsibility lies with the Syrian people; they make the decisions.
There was no direct communication [with the new Syrian administration of Ahmed Hussein al-Sharaa, formerly known as Abu Mohammad al-Julani]. There were some very limited, indirect attempts by ground-based groups, but they didn’t lead anywhere.
We have the right to be cautious. We’ve received reports from both Western and Arab countries suggesting that such ideas exist, that someone wants the new Syrian regime to serve a role in destabilizing Lebanon.
Some countries speak positively to Lebanon but offer nothing in return. Meanwhile, they hope to use Syria as leverage against us.
As Syria once controlled Lebanon in various ways and sometimes served foreign agendas, some actors are looking to repeat that experience with a new formula.
We hope these ideas remain theoretical and are never implemented. Lebanese political leaders must stay alert to those who offer words without action.
The current stance is not against Hezbollah, but against the Shiites and against Lebanon itself.
Calls to disarm Hezbollah align with Israeli demands and aim to strip Lebanon of its only real source of strength: its resistance.
Lebanon’s strength lies in its people, its army, and its resistance. Anyone advocating to disarm the resistance is, in effect, weakening the entire country.
There are those who believe that elections and national governance can proceed without the Shiite sect’s participation. [Shia Muslims are ~30% of the total Lebanese population]
When they say they want a Shiite MP in parliament who doesn’t belong to Amal or Hezbollah, their aim is to eliminate both. We are one family, one land, one resistance.
Let no one think we are weak. We are strong by God, and our resilience, sacrifices, and steadfastness are what keep Lebanon standing.
We welcome any Arab or foreign effort that contributes to Lebanon’s reconstruction, but not on the basis of turning Lebanon into a client state.
We support the extension of UNIFIL's mandate, but we reject any unilateral operations by UNIFIL within villages and private properties without army coordination.
Hezbollah is a movement, a belief, a national project. The weapon is just one part of it, and not the defining part.
[Addressing Hezbollah’s detractors] What have you accomplished for Lebanon? Our track record speaks for itself: the liberation of southern Lebanon in 2000, the deterrence of Israeli aggression, and 17 years of security since the 2006 war.
They speak of wings and factions [within Hezbollah], but I see no wings flying. The party is united, the leadership is united, and our decisions are made collectively through the Shura Council.
My love for Sayyed [Hassan Nasrallah] was deep, personal, and beyond formality. His leadership lifted burdens from all of us. His martyrdom is a badge of honor.
We are continuing on this path with loyalty and strength. Our journey is long, with ups and downs, but it is a journey of great reward.
I will conclude this article with the news of a new US ultimatum to Hezbollah and Lebanon. Here is what Tom Barrack, US Ambassador to Turkey and Special Envoy to Syria, stated in an interview with The National yesterday (Friday 11th July 2025), cited in this Al Mayadeen article today:
You have Israel on one side, you have Iran on the other, and now you have Syria manifesting itself so quickly that, if Lebanon doesn’t move, it’s going to be Bilad Al Sham1 again. Syrians say Lebanon is our beach resort. So we need to move.
…adding that the Outlaw US Empire and Gulf states (e.g. Saudi Arabia and Qatar) are “prepared to support Lebanon financially, but only if Beirut agrees to a sweeping deal that includes ‘Hezbollah’s full disarmament’ and implementation of economic reforms dictated by external parties”.
Probably realizing that he said the quiet part out loud, earlier today Tom Barrack tweeted the following statement:
Too late, Tom, too late! Next time, try connecting your mouth to the brain before talking… if you have a brain!
Thanks, as always, Ismaele. It's great to learn where Hezbollah Secretary-General Sheikh Naim Qassem stands on things.
Israel has unlimited air support from U.S. and all that UK has in the area. Trump does not worry stock depletion when Israel needs bombs, missiles and other “kit”.
Because of this there is no career in open hostilities.
The strategy of hit and run guerrilla raids with long range fires effecting Israel rear areas is all that make sense.