Hezbollah's new Secretary-General Naim Qassem gave his maiden speech as the leader of the terrorist organization today (Wednesday) outlining his intended policies and justifying Hezbollah's actions against Israel.
After thanking the Hezbollah Shura for appointing him to the position, Qassem said that "my working plans are a continuation of Hassan Nasrallah's working plans in all areas, including Jihad and politics," according to Israel Hayom.
He also justified Hezbollah's intervention in the war in Gaza by saying that "Israel does not need an excuse to attack" and pointed to multiple cases in which Israel allegedly violated Lebanese territorial integrity without provocation, all the way back to 1982.
Qassem then went on to say, perhaps in defiance of claims that Hezbollah is Iran's puppet, that "we are fighting for ourselves and not for the interests of anyone else. We pay a price for this. This is for liberation, independence, and for the Palestinians."
He then claimed that "Iran doesn't want a thing from us. It only supports us without expecting something in return. We are fighting for our land. The land of Lebanon."
Further defending Iran, he said that the leader of the Iranian Revolution, "Khomeini, declared that one must act to wipe Israel off the map, for the Palestinians. Iran has paid a price for decades because of its stance on the Palestinian issue. This is a respectable position."