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In belligerent, warmongering language, Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah last week threatened to attack the Mediterranean island of Cyprus — a European nation — if it opened its military bases to Israel.

The EU leapt to Cyprus’s defense, and warned that any threat to a member state was a threat against the whole bloc, while pro-Hezbollah media gloated that Nasrallah had provoked global panic about a regional war. Before his speech Israel said operational plans for an offensive in Lebanon had been approved, and Foreign Minister Israel Katz said an all-out war would lead to Hezbollah’s destruction.

Meanwhile other reports quoted eyewitnesses as saying Hezbollah had been using Beirut airport to transport and store weapons. The airport was bombed in 2006, and before the latest conflict Israel had threatened to bomb it again if Hezbollah used it for arms smuggling. Many Lebanese panicked about being trapped in a war zone with no flights out, while airport staff voiced fears about Israeli airstrikes. The airport is in a densely populated part of the capital that includes Hezbollah strongholds, stoking fears that it would be on the front line of any conflict. There are rumors about Hezbollah weapons stockpiled elsewhere in the capital, including districts controlled by the militia’s Christian allies. This conjures up traumatic memories of the mass loss of life in the immensely destructive 2020 explosion at Beirut port, where Hezbollah had also been storing explosives.

Nasrallah’s message to the Lebanese people........

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