JERUSALEM (JTA) — Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah threatened to hit large ammonia gas tanks in Haifa that he said would wreak damage and casualties equal to a nuclear attack.
Nasrallah made the threats about a future attack on northern Israel during a speech in Beirut.
“This would be exactly as a nuclear bomb, and we can say that Lebanon today has a nuclear bomb, seeing as any rocket that might hit these tanks is capable of creating a nuclear bomb effect,” he said.
Israel’s environmental protection minister, Avi Gabbai, later told the Israeli media that he had ordered the ammonia storage facility be moved to the Negev Desert in the southern part of Israel.
Nasrallah added that Hezbollah’s military might is preventing attacks by Israel, and Israel would not attack unless it knew it could win and in a short amount of time.
He also accused Israel of planning to topple Syrian President Bashar Assad, saying those plans have failed.
Nasrallah condemned Arab countries that have or are working toward normalizing relations with Israel.
“Do you accept a friend occupying Sunni land in Palestine? Can you become friends with an entity that has committed the most horrible massacres against the Sunni community?” he asked. “You are free to consider Iran an enemy, but how can you consider Israel a friend and ally? This issue must be confronted in a serious manner.”
