Tehran ‘will back Lebanese against Israel’

IRAN’S president said that if the Israelis launch a new war against Lebanon’s Hezbollah, the militant group should retaliate strongly enough to “close their case once and for all”.

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s comments, in a conversation with Hezbollah’s leader, were the latest in a heated exchange of rhetoric between Israel, Lebanon and Syria this month in which all sides have been warning the other not to start a war.

Speaking by phone, Ahmadinejad urged Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah to prepare his fighters to be able to retaliate strongly against any Israeli attack.