BEIRUT, March 2 (Reuters) – Lebanon’s government on Monday banned military activities by Hezbollah after it opened fire on Israel to avenge the killing of Iran’s supreme leader – a move likely to fuel tension with the Tehran-backed group as it faced a new Israeli offensive.
Israel launched heavy airstrikes on the Hezbollah-controlled southern suburbs of Beirut and more widely in Lebanon on Monday, in response to the Hezbollah drone and rocket strike, killing 31 people, according to the Lebanese health ministry.
The U.S. and Israel launched attacks against Iran on Saturday, triggering retaliatory strikes across the region from Tehran.
Hezbollah, which was founded by Iran’s Revolutionary Guards in 1982, said its attack was to avenge “the pure blood” of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed in the bombing on Saturday.
Israel held Hezbollah responsible for the escalation and declared Hezbollah leader Naim Qassem a “target for elimination”.
In a statement after a cabinet meeting, Prime Minister Nawaf Salam said the state rejected any military actions launched from Lebanese territory “outside the framework of its legitimate institutions and affirmed that the decision of war and peace is exclusively in its hands”.
This “necessitates the immediate prohibition of all Hezbollah’s security and military activities as being outside the law, and obliging it to hand over its weapons to the Lebanese state”, he said.
(Reporting by Laila Bassam in Beirut, Jana Choukeir in Dubai; Yomna Ehab and Nayera Abdallah in Cairo; Writing by Nayera Abdallah and Tom Perry; Editing by Bill Berkrot, Michael Perry and Sharon Singleton)
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