Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu responded to threats from Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah on Thursday, warning that if the Iranian-backed terrorist group attacks Israel, it would suffer a "crushing blow."
Speaking at the Prime Minister's Residence in Jerusalem, Netanyahu said, "I heard the arrogant words that came from the direction of Hezbollah. This comes from the same man who, after 2006, said that if he had known what Israel's response would be to the abduction of two of our soldiers, he would have thought twice about doing it."
The abduction of Israeli soldiers Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev on July 12, 2006, triggered the Second Lebanon War, in which some 1,000 Lebanese people were killed, about half of them civilians.
"Today I suggest that he [Nasrallah] think not twice but 20 times because if he confronts us he will receive a crushing blow that he cannot even imagine," Netanyahu said.
At a memorial ceremony for IDF soldiers killed in the 1973 Yom Kippur War earlier in the day, Netanyahu also issued a stern warning to Iran.
"We must make every effort to avoid war, but if we are forced into it, we will act forcibly against those who try to kill us," the prime minister said.
"Those who try to kill us today in the Middle East are led first and foremost by Iran and its aggression, which blatantly calls for our destruction. It is our duty to protect ourselves from this threat."
Nasrallah addressed Israel in a televised speech on Thursday, saying, "No matter what you do to cut the route, the matter is over and the resistance possesses precision and non-precision rockets and weapons capabilities.
"If Israel forces a war on Lebanon, Israel will face a fate and a reality it has never expected on any day."
Nasrallah stressed that Hezbollah's precision weapons are "highly accurate."
He said Israel knows the regional balance of power has changed, and that recent Israeli strikes in Syria to prevent Hezbollah from acquiring those weapons failed because this "has already been achieved."
