Nasrallah: Israel flexing military muscles in preparation for war

Hizbullah Secretary-General Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah said on Sunday that Israel's recent military training maneuvers near the Lebanese border were intended to prepare for a new war on Lebanon.

Nasrallah also said Hizbullah's own drills in southern Lebanon were in direct response to the Israeli exercises, intended to send out ''a clear message'' to the Israeli leadership that Hizbullah was ready to fight.

''The (Israeli) enemy has been conducting military maneuvers for months. The latest maneuvers occurred a few weeks ago near the Lebanese border in which 50,000 Israeli officers and soldiers participated,'' Nasrallah told a Hizbullah rally in south Beirut.

''These maneuvers are to prepare for an attack on Lebanon,'' he said.

The pro-Hizbullah newspaper Al-Akhbar reported that thousands of unarmed Hizbullah fighters took part in the organization's own maneuvers, which was later confirmed by a senior Hizbullah official who would not give further details.

Prime Minister Fuad Saniora downplayed the event as just a simulation and UN peacekeeping force patrolling a zone along the border in southern Lebanon said no maneuvers were observed in their area of operations.

The newspaper said Nasrallah personally supervised the maneuvers, which it said were carried out in the last three days without weapons or uniforms, billing it as the biggest ever staged on Israel's border.

'Hizbullah will change region'

''I tell the (Israeli) enemy that these maneuvers were real, serious and big. I am not going to give details. There is a great deal of readiness (by Hizbullah) which the enemy must understand,'' Nasrallah said in his speech Sunday.

''These maneuvers were intended to send out a clear message to the world which is besieging us and to this enemy that that the resistance in Lebanon possesses determination, men and the necessary and sufficient weapons to defend Lebanon,'' Nasrallah proclaimed, drawing cheers from the crowd.

Without elaborating, he added, ''The resistance is ready to make a victory for Lebanon that will change the region's face.''

The rally, attended by several thousand Hizbullah supporters waving the group's yellow banners and the

Lebanese flag, was organized by the group to mark Lebanon's Martyr's Day.

Nasrallah, who remains in hiding as he fears a possible Israeli attempt on his life, did not personally attend the rally.

Celebratory fireworks and gunfire erupted at the start and end of his 90-minute speech.