"We will not forgive anyone who confiscates a bullet," Nasrallah said.
Lebanese authorities seized a truck carrying weapons in the outskirts of Beirut on February 8. The truck had been loaded with hand guns, assault rifles and rockets hidden under a blanket of animal feed.
Hezbollah had acknowledged the ammunition belonged to the group and demanded the government immediately release the shipment. It urged the government to abide by its own policy, proclaimed in 2005, to support the "resistance" in the south.
Defense Minister Elias Murr refused to return the weapons to Hezbollah, and said there were reports of possible attacks being planned by 'fundamentalist groups' against U.N. peacekeepers in Lebanon.
"I refuse to return the weapons to Hezbollah," Murr said on Kalam el Nas talk show on LBC television following the seizure, in response to a Hezbollah demand for an immediate release of the shipment.
"While the Lebanese resisting army was fighting the Israelis … Hezbollah should have donated these munitions to the army, which is the side concerned in curbing violations, instead of demanding their return," Murr added.
This was a reference to the brief exchange of fire the prior day between Lebanese troops and the Israeli army on the Lebanon-Israel border.
Nasrallah Furious
"We will not forgive anyone who confiscates a bullet," he said in a speech Friday during the annual commemoration of the killing of two senior Hezbollah officials in Israeli attacks in 1987 and 1992.
"We are ready to provide the army with all the weapons that it requires ... but we will not forgive anyone who confiscates a bullet," he said.
Nasrallah said "we have plenty of weapons, of all kinds ... and we have the right to transport our arms to combat Israel, even if we transport them in secret to hide them from the Israeli enemy."
Despite previously belittling the nation's army, Nasrallah pledged his support: "The Resistance will always stand by the Lebanese army, with our weapons, men and blood ... to defend Lebanon," he said.
Nasrallah made a very rare appearance on Friday at a rally in the Beirut suburbs during a memorial marking the assassination of two of Hezbollah's former leaders, Sayyed Abbas al-Musawi and Sheikh Ragheb Harb. Both were killed by Israeli ambushes during its occupation of south Lebanon in the 80s and 90s.
Sources: Ya Libnan, Reuters
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