Nasrallah: Hezbollah won't remain idle

BEIRUT, Lebanon, Aug. 4 (UPI) -- The Lebanese Army protects Hezbollah, and Hezbollah protects the army, a winning formula against Israel's aggression, Hezbollah's Sheik Hassan Nasrallah said.

In a fiery televised speech Tuesday night, just hours after a deadly clash at the Israel-Lebanon border left five Israeli and Lebanese soldiers and civilians dead, Nasrallah warned Hezbollah would not remain idle in future confrontations.

"We were ready to fight and defend … but the wisdom, interest and loyalty meant that the resistance put itself at the disposal of the army, which was dealing with the confrontation," the Beirut newspaper The Daily Star quoted Nasrallah saying.

"I say honestly, that in any place where the Lebanese Army will be assaulted and there is a presence for the resistance, the resistance will not stand silent, or quiet or restrained. The Israeli hand that targets the Lebanese Army will be cut off," the Hezbollah chief said.

During his speech, marking the fourth anniversary since the end of the Second Lebanon War in 2006, Nasrallah accused Israel of assassinating former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, who was killed in a car bomb in Beirut in 2005.

"I accuse the Israeli enemy of the assassination of (former) Prime Minister Rafik Hariri and … I will prove this by unveiling sensitive information at a press conference on Monday," Nasrallah said.

A U.N. investigation of that incident implicated Syria.