“If Syria falls, so will Palestine” – this was the claim made by Hassan Nasrallah in his May 25 address to a rally in Beirut. It sounds like an extraordinary claim. The far less contentious claim, I would think, is that if Syria falls, so will Lebanon.

Lebanon is a country that is already crowded with its population of 4.3 million. It is also already home to 600,000 Palestinian refugees. If the conflict in Syria continues, there will soon be more than a million Syrian refugees added to that mix! There is no way that the infrastructure of the country will handle a refugee population that could number more than 50% of its citizenry!

Perhaps Nasrallah was only throwing Palestine into the mix to broaden the appeal of his message. After all, support for Palestine against Israel is the common denominator between all states in the Arab and Muslim worlds. Even so, the fate of Syria certainly has broad implications for the region.

Apart from the threat to Lebanon, the  isolation of Iran would be the most immediate ramification of the fall of Syria, and this is surely  what Syria’s enemies are striving for. It is Iran that is resisting US/Israeli control of the region. As far as the super-powers are concerned, the Syrian people are just the canon-fodder in the broader battle for regional hegemony.

Father Dave

Hassan Nasrallah

source: www.haaretz.com…

If Syria falls, so will Palestine, Hezbollah’s Nasrallah warns in speech

By Jack Khoury

In a televised speech, Nasrallah says Israel ‘fears rockets’ and cautions that militant factions taking over Syria ‘pose a threat to Lebanon.’

Hezbollah Chief Hassan Nasrallah opened a front against al-Qaida and its affiliated groups, especially in Syria, stressing on Saturday that his organization was prepared to send tens of thousands of combatants to defend Syria.

In a televised speech marking the 13th anniversary of the Israeli pullout from southern Lebanon, Nasrallah also said that “if Syria falls, so will Palestine, the West Bank, Gaza, and Jerusalem. We will enter a very dark phase.”

He also spoke about Israeli preparations for a possible conflict with Hezbollah and said that Israel formed a new government portfolio dedicated to protecting the home front. “In Israel everything is geared up for a conflict year round and all year they hold maneuvers. Israel fears rockets, because we have no air force. The Israelis built towns along its borders. They are bringing in Jews from Ethiopia, Romania, and Argentina, and placing them by our borders and providing them with money and arms. On our side of the border, our towns are nearly empty.”

Nasrallah did not present the fighting as a conflict between Sunni and Shiite Muslims, but rather as one waged between heathens serving a Western Zionist agenda and the Syrian resistance that refuses to accept the dictates of the West.
Nasrallah unequivocally stressed that the fall of the Syrian regime would be a blow to the “resistance.” “Syria is the backbone of the ‘resistance,’ that cannot sit still and wait while its backbone is being broken,” he said. “If Syria falls in the hands of the Americans and the Israelis and the American representatives in the region, the ‘resistance’ will be isolated and Israel will enter Lebanon and force its laws upon it. Lebanon will return to the Israeli era.”

In his speech, Nasrallah tied the U.S. and Israel to Jihadist organizations working under the aegis of al-Qaida in Syria: “These combatants coming from many countries received many allowances to leave their countries and arrive at Syria, this is the American method of destabilizing Syria from the inside, using these organizations that brand everyone is heathens, those organizations that had killed more Sunni Muslims than anyone else. An example of this is what is happening in Iraq, Pakistan, and Somalia. We think that the armed forces taking over Syria are a great danger to Lebanon and all the Lebanese, not only Hezbollah or the Lebanese Shiites.”

A great deal of Nasrallah’s speech was devoted to the situation in Syria, with Nasrallah reiterating his support for Assad’s regime. He added that “What is taking place in Syria is very important to Lebanon and is crucial to our future. We are on the border. We have the courage to talk and act and thus we will speak honestly – our position was clear from the get go. The demand for reforms is acceptable and this government has a place. Reforms should begin along with political dialog.”

Regarding Hezbollah’s involvement in the fighting in Syria, Nasrallah said: “We started getting involved only a few months ago. We tried to initiate contact through all our channels but they didn’t listen, stubbornly they decided to reject the dialogue – they want to overthrow the government at any costs.”

Nasrallah went on to say “We are in a delicate point in history. There is no time to burry our heads in the sand, it is time to raise our heads and stand tall in the face of the hurricane. So, in all honesty, what has this country [Lebanon] done? The Lebanese nation isn’t prepared to face the Israeli threat.”

According to him “The Lebanese resistance changed the Israeli equation. Currently, we are protecting Lebanon, Palestine, and Syria.”